


The Letter Box

by Caro_jtm



Category: SKAM (France)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Eliott 'romantic ass' Demaury is there all along, Eliott POV, F/F, F/M, Kinda-strangers/abitofenemies-to-lovers, M/M, like prepare prepare, prepare yourself for a slow-burn my folks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-04-21
Packaged: 2021-02-23 14:37:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 34,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23146402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caro_jtm/pseuds/Caro_jtm
Summary: Eliott Demaury is in love with love and he's taking his chances to find it.Or: About letters that can turnabout one's life completely.
Relationships: Eliott Demaury/Lucas Lallemant
Comments: 27
Kudos: 45





	1. Prologue

****

Friday, the thirteen. According to a huge amount of population the most unlucky day in the year. Nor for Eliott, he didn’t believe in such things _but just in case_ he preferred to stay at home and to do some cleaning and organize his chaotic small apartment. He decided to start with the bedroom, which probably wasn’t a good idea because, by the things he found, he didn’t even get to the kitchen or anywhere outside his safe place; as if there were a lot of rooms, not only the kitchen, bathroom, and tiny hall but still all messy as befits Eliott’s artistic soul. The boy sat on the floor, completely forgetting about the cleaning idea, stuck with the box that he got from his father a while ago. Eliott could clearly remember that day and even that the subsequent events of his life were presumably the worst he has ever experienced, that evening with his parents was probably the last ray of sunshine right before the storm and that's why Eliott took deep care of this memory.

_It was a Sunday evening, three weeks before Christmas but in Eliott’s parents’ house everyone already could feel the sense of the Christmas spirit. It was so typical for the Demaury’ family, they put way too many angels figurines all around their house, Christmas lights were hanging in every, literally every room; and yes, you could also use a toilette and being surrounded by dim but colorful fairy lights. Hugo and Gabrielle hitched some mistletoes to every chandelier that were placed on the ground floor and they didn’t care when Eliott was repeating himself that this plant is nasty and he doesn’t like it. They were kissing his cheeks every time when he stood under the plant and he was rolling his eyes to this but couldn’t deny that he loved that._

_After a family lazy day, at nine, Gabrielle was sitting on the armchair, playing with their cat, the one-eye ball of fluff, aka Mike. Eliott laying on the sofa was trying to focus on the movie that he chose but after all day of strolling, eating way too much amazing food that his parents prepared, he was simply too tired to concentrate on the moving pictures. Hugo nudged Eliott’s knee and nodded towards the stairs. The boy yawned, stretched a bit and followed his father upstairs. His mind was still like behind the fog so at first he didn’t realize that they went into his old room. Eliott moved out from his childhood house right before starting university; living in Paris was a wiser choice than staying in the countryside and commuting for hours every day. Now his room was a mixture of his old stuff, his father’s office and his mother yoga place. Eliott was impressed by how Gabrielle managed to arrange there everything so well._

_Hugo sat on the chair, right after Eliott chose his place on his old couch. The older one pulled up to his son, already keeping a medium-sized wooden box in his hands. Eliott didn’t even notice the moment when and where his father got that. It was just a brown box, without any engraved pattern or any specifics that would give a hint of what was hidden inside it. Even the lock was so dark that it almost intermingled with the color of the box._

_“It’s for you.” Hugo put the thing on Eliott’s lap and smiled. “Don’t open it now, or even when you will go back to your place. I put there a few envelopes with some important and not so important stuff, most of them are mine. But please, don’t open it yet. You are a smart guy, Eliott, you will know when the right time comes.”_

_Eliott was glancing at the box and his father repeatedly. He didn’t understand what it was all about. Of course, he was aware of the weirdness of his own father, he knew him for about twenty years already, and it’s enough to say that he was a science teacher in high school and he loved his job, but liking being a teacher of some jumpy teenagers wasn’t the weirdest thing. He was trying to teach chemistry or physics by music, bringing to his classes the guitar or taking his students to the art room where he could use the piano. Hugo was indeed, an extraordinary man._

_“Dad, if I cannot open it now, why are you giving me this right now?”_

_“Because I want to. That’s a fair reason.” The man joked but Eliott could notice the glimpse of uncertainty in his eyes; the same blue-greyish ones as Eliott’s. “Just promise me that you won’t open any of these envelopes any time soon, okay?” The boy nodded and both of them started to stare at each other. Eliott tried to read his father’s mind, to guess his intention but in this blue-greyish color, he could only sense the tenderness and feel the warm aura that he could always feel when he was so near to his parent._

_“Soo, are you gonna tell me when I can do this?” Eliott finally asked, holding the box tighter than it was needed._

_“I said already, Boo. When the time will come, you will know it.” The boy nodded again, staring at the wooden box and after just a second he felt warm embrace around his arms. Hugo was hugging him so tightly that Eliott felt like he was a five-year-old boy again._

_“Come on, Boo. I bet your mum gave Mike all the food that I prepared for him for the whole week, we have to rescue that poor animal.”_

_The men got up and went out of the room. Eliott was right behind his father, keeping the box under his arm and unexpectedly he felt a strong urge to say those four words._

_“I love you, dad.”_

_Hugo turned to his son, smiling as brightly as he was looking at his whole world._

_“I love you too, Boo.”_

And here he was, sitting on the floor of his own bedroom, staring at the bunch of envelopes. Eliott hasn’t even checked all the stuff that his papa put there, he decided that opening and checking all the things in one sitting would be a waste, so he was doing his little discovering session from time to time, trying to not become too attached to anything that he would find there.

Eliott already knew that there was a signet ring. The one that Eliott knew he would get someday and his father asked him to wear it all the time but he couldn’t make himself to do so. His hands were almost constantly dirty because of the paint or chalk, he simply didn’t want to destroy his father’s favorite jewelry. The next thing he found in the box was the photo of his father keeping little Eliott in his hands, right after his birth. The boy had a similar photo on his desk but that one was with his mum, tired, completely exhausted but still smiling at the camera, and his father focused on little baby Eliott as he was the whole world. His father had the same spark in his eyes every time he was looking at him, the look full of love and softness. The boy could stare at this picture for hours and even though he knew this was impossible however, he could almost remember the happiness that their parents felt on the day of his birth, all the stories from them and his grandparents let him experienced all the emotions they encountered. Another thing Eliott found in one of the envelopes was a small paintbrush, one of the firsts his papa bought for him. The beginning of Eliott’s paint journey was a disaster, a complete failure and sometimes he really wondered how it was possible that he still painted or made videos, just create for the sake of creation not to please anyone else. His art was for him, not for the audience.

But this wasn’t the case from the beginning. Already in preschool Eliott was, as you can say for three to six years old boy, deeply interested in art. He was making one even with his food during lunches that of course drove his nursery teacher crazy but he was just a small kid, nobody made a big deal of it. Later, in primary school the art was treated as something debilitating as if being interested in art made Eliott stupid or weird, so he stopped showing his talent off. But then, when he was thirteen, during the camp, he was surrounded by kids that they were mostly interested in painting, creating and with completely different views on art than the people from his school. Eliott felt free, he had open mind and soul, created something new every day without asking anyone about their opinions, just trying not to rely on others.

_When Eliott started middle school, he asked his parents to sign him up for additional art classes and they were even happier than he was because as his father and mother always said, Eliott had a too pure and amazing soul and he could express his true self only by art._

_And he went to his class, thirteen years old boy surrounded by older teenagers but still, strongly convinced that he’s gonna be alright, regardless of being alone. His dad bought for him every needed, or even more than a needed thing, his bag was full of paintbrushes, small canvas, various pens, and crayons and he bought him even chalk. During the lesson, he saw all the masterpieces that people were drawing, amazing landscapes or portraits but he could only think about small raccoon wandering around his own world, so he painted it with one the brushes that his father bought for him. When his teacher saw his sketch, she almost laughed and only one look into her eyes made Eliott broke inside and tears appeared in his own blue-greyish ones. He failed. He was only lying to himself and he would never be an artist. This thought couldn’t leave his mind. He didn’t deserve to have all the amazing stuff his papa bought for him._

_When he reached his home, he threw the bag on the floor in the living room, shouted ‘I am not enough’ and he hid in his bedroom for the rest of the day._

_Hugo knocked on the door and Eliott, even though still full of sadness and anger, let his father in. They sat on the floor, leaning on Eliott’s bed._

_“I think you should keep it.” The man said, handing one of the brushed to Eliott. The boy just shook his head, feeling that he would start crying again. “Hey, look at me.” Eliott heard Hugo’s voice and the boy was lingering a bit but finally he lifted his head._

_“You are enough, Eliott. And you are going to be an amazing artist. I am sure of it. And I and mama will be at every of your exhibition, telling stories from your childhood that you would find embarrassing but for us they are endearing. And after each of the events, we’re gonna take a picture, and I’ll make you an album and give it to you for your fiftieth birthday, and we’re gonna watch it with my grandkids and with the love of your life. Everything will be okay Eliott because you are enough. Remember it, always.” Hugo hugged him tightly and Eliott took the paintbrush from him._

Since then, Eliott has never stopped trying to be better and better, trying not to care about others’ opinions. His own was the most important one and Eliott knew he was enough.

He was fiddling with this exact brush in his left hand when he reached for the next envelope. This one looked as nothing was in it but when Eliott finally put away the brush and opened the thing, he noticed there was one piece of paper. The anxious feeling appeared inside his chest because he expected from the moment he got the box that he would find something like this, the letter from his father.

But when he unfolded the sheet he saw only a very short note. 

_“My Boo,_

_Never lose hope. Love your love, fully. I know you know what I am talking about and I am sure that you need just a little reminder so here it is._

_Do everything for your love, my son. Don’t be afraid._

_Love, Dad_

_Ps. You are enough.”_

Eliott read these words repeatedly and he couldn’t believe how well his father knew him. And he was right, Eliott needed a small reminder. He put all the stuff inside the box, didn’t even paying attention to any of the other envelopes. The boy took the piece of paper from the drawer and started writing, and through all the time he kept smiling, thinking about his father, and his love.

He was not afraid. Not anymore.


	2. Un

_My Love,_

_I hope you are okay, I hope whenever you are and with whoever you are, you are happy and your precious smile never leaves your beautiful face. I would be so glad to see it sometime, only for a quick second or two. Just to notice in your mesmerizing eyes that you are truly happy._

_For a long time I thought that our world would collide somehow without putting any effort, you know, like in these old romantic movies with such cliché tropes. We would look at each other from a distance, the rain already pouring in the background, we would walk towards each other, and looking into each other’s eyes, as nobody and nothing would exist around us. And then, I would finally be able to touch you, I would be so gentle, I promise, and then you would flash a smile and I would melt inside at the sight of it but I would stay still because I would be scared that one wrong move, one unsubtle touch and you would disappear. After all, you would have been only a piece of my imagination._

_As you are right now._

_My mama says that having a romantic personality is a blessing from God (as if he exists). She claims that souls such as mine are the purest in our cruel world. Of course, I nod my head to this because I would never say to my mama that her words are bullshit. But for real, my love, your future mother-in-law is claiming the worst gibberish ever. How would it be possible that I have such a pure and blessed soul but sill, I am writing this letter? Something is not clicking, right? But my mama is an amazing woman and I will never say, on purpose, anything to make her sad. She has had enough of that._

_But my love, I hope that at least you don’t surround yourself with anyone who makes you miserable. I am simply unable to imagine your face but, and maybe you would think that it is impossible, I can already see your eyes, definitely mesmerizing and the one that would make me fall in love at first sight, and thinking about you crying, thinking about tears appearing on your cheeks, makes me distressed in an instant._

_As silly as it sounds, writing this letter is not the way to get over you, to be finally ‘free’ and after closing the envelope I would live a full life. It is quite the opposite. This letter is my scream for you, to even dig deeper and deeper because I know you are there, somewhere. And those who say that you just have to let go and then love will come to you, sorry but that is bullshit. You wanna love? Fight for it! Even if it is a love like mine, completely out of this world, limitless and unapprehended. I know I love you, I already knew that a long time ago, I always knew it._

_I only have to find you._

_And when I will find you, we are going to be happy together. Do not get me wrong my love, I am pretty content with my life as it is and I am sure your life is as amazing as you are but believe me, sharing marvelous moments would make our lives a thousand times better. I wouldn’t be surprised if you just rolled your eyes at my silliness but love, put some trust in me._

_I cannot wait to meet you. To learn everything about you. To let myself be me around you._

_Love, please. Let me find you._

_I already let myself be found by you._

_Always yours,_

_Verginius._

Eliott folded the piece of paper in half and for a short moment, he was staring at it in disbelief. He did this. He really wrote it. The boy chuckled under his nose and put the letter into the envelope. The bit of courage given by his father was the final catalyst to write this letter and Eliott couldn’t be more proud of himself. When he was pressing the line with the glue to close his secret properly, he glanced at the clock; it was already half-past two. Writing this, the text pretty short as for his unstoppable imagination, took him about five hours. Five hours of walking around the apartment after writing every each sentence, five hours of doing short breaks and just staring at the ceiling. But not even for a second his love ever left his mind. It was with him all the time.

Eliott reached his phone and he was so close to call to his friend, but it was almost two damn in the morning, and even though he was pretty sure that Emma would pick the phone up, Eliott remembered that she had another date with ‘not’ her guy. Or at least she had a date on Friday evening but judging by the lack of messages and calls from her, Eliott was certain that the date wasn’t over yet.

He switched the lights off and lay on the floor for a bit, he started softly waving his hand above his head, pretending to make shapes around his furniture. He stuck for a while with the shape of a clock on the wall, staring at every passing second. It was so slow, so calming and soothing. He counted to four hundred sixty-two seconds when some car drove near to his building and the sound and the flash of the lights made Eliott focus on his letter again. He started to think about what would happen if somebody opened it if that person would be happy or maybe thought that Eliott was _crazy._

At the exact moment, the words from his father’s note appeared in his mind _‘Do everything for your love, my son. Don’t be afraid.’_

Without further thinking, he put on only his brown jacket because September’s nights weren’t so cold after all and after putting the letter into the inside pocket, he left the flat. Parisian streets were so silent at those hours; Eliott’s only companion was some cat, who run from building to building, probably trying to find some cozy place to sleep. For a moment, the boy was stalking the little animal that was wandering and trying to decide where it would go but finally, the cat had enough of human presence and run across the street. Eliott burst into a laugh because he could swear that the animal meowed directly at him.

He walked for a few minutes more, still surrounded only by silence and then he stood in the middle of the street island, took a deep breath and stretched a bit. The boy realized that his letter fell out from his pocket, he crouched and lifted the letter from the street, staring at it for a bit. Eliott’s smile was still present on his face, it was there from the moment he closed the letter in the envelope.

He was sure of this decision. He was going to put it somewhere. This letter had to be read by someone, anyone. 

After a little more of wandering around the city Eliott heard the sound of the closing door behind him and in the last second, he was able to stop them from shutting. The action was absolutely unconscious, Eliott did this completely on the spur of the moment. He wasn’t even sure if the people or person that went into the building saw him or not, because clearly, he wasn’t aware of the appearance of anyone behind him, too deep into his thoughts to be distracted by some anonymous face. 

The boy had no idea about where exactly he was but it still felt right to be there, in some random tenement, with a dim light and only twelve letterboxes. And maybe it was cliché and silly but number seven was lucky for Eliott. Moreover, the sunflower was lying under that box so Eliott knew that the universe was giving him a sign. From all the flowers in the world, it was a sunflower that appeared under the boy’s feet so it couldn’t have been a coincidence. He opened the slot of the letterbox number seven and put there his letter. For even a second not fear or anxiety appeared in his body, Eliott only felt the full joy. He caught the sunflower from the floor, not giving a damn if somebody put it on purpose or by accident. When the boy went out on the pavement he felt the rain on his cheeks but he didn’t care, without even putting the jacket on his head, he turned into the first street on the right and he walked and walked, grinning and humming some melody that he heard a while ago in the radio. 

Everything was right.

****

After Eliott got home it was after the four and the last time he checked his phone was at four forty-four in the morning and then he had zero notifications but when he barely opened his one eye, he saw that he already had eleven messages and three calls from Emma, two from his mama and one from work. The last one Eliott preferred to ignore, he deserved a day off and maybe it wasn’t very kind of him, but ignoring was definitely a better option that day. He would be glad to not even see all the notifications and sleep more but a way too loud knocking on the door awake him, and he was sure who stood in front of his door.

“Finally, I was calling to you and calling and of course your lazy ass was asleep as if it was something new but it is not because I bet you were walking around during night like some weirdo.” 

Eliott was able to open his door slightly and Emma already walked in with a huge bag of food and during her little ‘greeting’ she already was making a fuss in the kitchen, searching for needed utensils. 

“Good morning to you too?” Eliott answered in a sarcastic tone, brushing his hand into morning messy hair. “What time is it?” He added while Emma remained silent. He wanted to make sure how long he slept because he didn’t even glance at the clock when he was looking at his notifications. 

„Almost two in the afternoon, early bird.” She put a kettle on the stove and took out two cups from the cupboard, she behaved as if she was at her place and Eliott definitely didn’t mind it. He really enjoyed having her around his place. “Why aren’t you asking me about anything?” Emma glanced at the boy with a suspicious look. “Oh gosh, what did you do? I know this look, it’s the one that shows you being so cocky and proud of something and I am scared when you look like this.” By the talk time, she poured the water into the cup and Eliott stole it from the girl’s hand and rolled his eyes. She knew him too well.

“I didn’t do anything, I was working a bit too long and I am just proud of what I did, that’s it. And I am not cocky.”

Maybe Emma was the best of the best friend but the secret about writing the letter would stay with him, no matter what. He wasn’t afraid of being judged by Emma, of hearing that he is stupid or naïve but he was rather afraid that she would be worried about him, that writing a letter wasn’t only _writing a letter._ Unfortunately, she always was way more concerned about Eliott than it was needed and on the one hand he really got it but on the other, well, he was sometimes tired of it. To Eliott’s mind, he had all the rights to have such a small secret, it didn’t harm anybody and for sure, not even him.

“So, how was the date?” The boy asked, sitting on his couch, while Emma was making omelets. He sent her the biggest smile as he could to show his gratitude for what she was doing. She just knew that Eliott had nothing to eat at his place so she literally bought every grocery that he would like to eat, including his favorites jellybeans that if it was enough for his body, he would eat every single day, but of course, he didn’t; contrary to popular belief he still had some common sense.

“We are official. Like official, official. He actually said ‘do you want to be my girlfriend’ sentence.” Emma answered, smiling so widely that Eliott was sure it hurt her at least a bit. He chuckled seeing such happiness. 

“I’m happy for you, Ginny.” The boy responded, and after putting the cup on the mat and getting up from his seat, he put a kiss on the girl’s forehead.

“Thank you, Boo and by the way, you promised not to call me that.” She sighted, back to the meal on the pan.

“No, I didn’t, you begged me to promise this and I just said that I won’t call you that in front of other people. Do you see anyone else here?” Eliott asked, pointing at the empty hall and his bedroom. Emma just rolled her eyes at him but this time with a smile.

_The whole ‘Ginny’ nickname was a very informed decision and great punishment for Emma, even though it wasn’t even made by Eliott. When they were nine years old, Eliott was obsessed, completely fixated on the Harry Potter books and movies. He could watch it on almost one sitting; going to the toilet or eating something didn’t count and the reading consumes him so deeply that one time he faked that he had a cold just to be able to stay at home and read._

_In 2009, right before the premiere of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Eliott’s fixation has reached its peak, the boy didn’t talk about anything else than Harry Potter. His whole room changed into the wizard chamber, he even bought the replica of Harry’s broomstick and it had its glorious place above Eliott’s bed._

_Emma was fed up with it. That was insufficient to say that she hated Harry Potter, her eyes were twitching every time Eliott was mentioning that name, seeing the adverts of the upcoming movie made her switch channels. So during one of the sleepovers at Eliott’s house when the boy played the first part of the series, Emma had enough of it._

_“I bet you wouldn’t be able to stop talking about Harry Potter until the end of the summer.”_

_Eliott just pressed play and the first sounds of the philosopher's stone have started playing in the background. At first, the boy didn’t take his friends’ word seriously, it was impossible not to talk about Harry. Not an option for him. But then, a little idea has appeared in his head._

_Eliott knew that Emma wasn’t a fan, in Eliott’s opinion of the best book series; to his mind it should be the opinion of the whole world, but his friend completely didn’t care about any kind of fun meetings or counting days till the premiere. So he thought that maybe her challenge could be helpful to change her approach._

_“I can do it.”_

_“Naah, you can’t.” Emma chuckled, seeing the seriousness on Eliott’s face._

_“I will do this and if I win, you will do everything I want.”_

_The girl glanced at the boy suspiciously but she reached out her hand but right before the moment that the boy would take it, she stopped half the way._

_“And if you lost, we are not gonna talk about Potter. Ever.” Emma stressed the last word and Eliott literally felt the creeps on his back._

_Not talking about Harry Potter for a few weeks was doable but totally erasing this subject from his talks, when he was spending with Emma about eighty percent of his time was a bit more terrifying, however, the vision of winning was too appealing for him._

_“Prepare yourself for the worst nightmare after my win.” The boy answered with a cheeky grin on his face and the girl, after shaking hands, responded with the same expression._

_After that, they run downstairs to Eliott’s parents to inform them about the dare. Emma wanted to be one hundred percent sure that Eliott would not talk about Potter and unfortunately for the boy, he knew that his parents loved Emma probably as much as him so they would be fair. Very unfair in Eliott’s opinion._

_Weeks were passing, Eliott was keeping his promise and Emma was more and more concerned about her defeat. She tried to finagle Eliott, watching Potter when he was coming to her home, or searching some new information about the premier and sharing it with Eliott however the boy remained silent, he had his inner power to resists such temptation. And right on the last day on vacation, they knew who won._

_On midnight, September the first, Eliott got up from his bed right away when the clock has started ringing. He heard Emma’s groaning when the lamps turned on._

_“Get up!” Eliott literally screamed into his best friend’s ear and it caused hurtful pillow slam on his face but nothing could destroy his great humor._

_“I said get up.” The boy repeated himself and pulled the girl’s hand that she was finally sitting on the bed. “I won and you lose.”_

_Emma yawned loudly, still not fully aware of what was happening. Eliott was standing right in front of her, grinning so much that his face has started hurt a bit, his feet couldn’t stay in one place and he was jumping a little, already keeping a huge package in his hands that he pulled out from his wardrobe in the meantime._

_“I knew I would win so I bought it for you about two weeks ago.”_

_Emma remained silent, now completely awake, trying to kill her friend with her eyes. She couldn’t believe that Eliott won. The win supposed to be so easy for her but as it turned out, she underestimated her friend’s willpower._

_“What is it and why it couldn’t wait till the morning?” The girl asked but still, took the package from Eliott’s hands._

_The boy couldn’t stop smiling. When Emma has started opening the box, he jumped on the bed and cuddle his pillow, trying to hold his laugh. He was so proud of the punishment and he couldn’t wait to see Emma’s reaction._

_“Are you kidding me?!” The girls screamed, getting up from the bed. She was keeping a black robe in her right hand and on the left, the witch hat._

_Eliott bought for her the whole Harry Potter costume, he even included the long socks that would look perfect with a grey skirt and black shoes._

_“My failure is to have this stupid costume in my closet?” Emma asked sarcastically, throwing the clothes on the bed._

_“Of course not, you have to wear it at the start of the school year.” He responded proudly._

_For a few seconds the girl remained silent but Eliott couldn’t stop himself anymore and he burst into a laugh, rolling on the bad during his friend’ a little internal crisis._

_“No, no, no, no, no, no.” Emma was shaking her head, as she sat on the verge of the mattress._

_“Yes, yes, yes Ems, I hope you are okay with being in Gryffindor, I know how much you love that house.”_

_The girl groaned loudly and Eliott didn’t even notice when she took the pillow and all he could see in her eyes was rage._

_“Emma put the pillow back.” He said, getting up from the bed and in the last second he was able to open the door and run through the hall to his parent’s bedroom to avoid getting the pillow on his face._

_“What are you doing here?” Hugo asked sleepily, seeing his son hiding behind the curtain._

_“He bought me a Gryffindor costume!” Emma screamed, standing in the entrance to the Hugo’s and Gabrielle’s room._

_“So you will be an amazing Ginny, my dear.” The man responded with a gentle voice and Eliott noticed right away the furiousness on Emma’s face has raised. She couldn’t stand Ginny in movies so that comparison wasn’t absolutely the worst that his father could choose._

_“You are a Ginny.” Eliott laughed, stepping out from the curtain and Emma just rolled her eyes. “Ginny, Ginny, Ginny.” The boy said melodically, seeing that it made Emma even more annoyed._

_“Both of you, go to sleep. Now.” The firm voice of Gabrielle was heard and right away everybody went back to their beds._

Eliott was back to the reality while Emma was still preparing the dinner slash very late breakfast, the girl was completely focused on her task, sticking the tongue out her mouth, measuring the proper amount of milk. The boy poured the glass of water and looked at his friend solicitously.

“It’s not too fast to get official?” He questioned, trying to not show how much he was concern about her new relation. The boy didn’t want to undermine his friend’s decision, he was simply worried about her, taking into account her last relationship, or more specific, how it ended.

“Boo, I met Yann almost three months ago and it was already our tenth date. I am not you Eliott, I am not gonna wait for a person in shining armor.”

“I am not wai..” He wanted to interrupt Emma, but she didn’t let him. “I am happy with him, he makes everything so easy and it’s amazing to have him around. He makes me laugh and that’s the only thing that you should be concern about.” She ended and Eliott could only nod to her words. “You’re happy, I am happy.” He whispered and gave another kiss on her head.

“Come on, I didn’t make this food only to throw it away. Eat!” Both of them took the plates with omelets and sat on the beige couch.

Emma was tucking away her food and Eliott even didn’t realize that he stopped doing the same and was looking at the girl a bit too long.

“What?” She asked, looking at him from the corner of her eye. “Eliott.” The girl added with a firmer voice.

“Did you tell him?” He finally said, trying to say what he had in mind without telling the most triggering words.

“About?” The girl played dump, reaching to the cup of tea. “You know about what, Emma.” She sighted and even the tone of her sight sounded sadder than her voice just a second ago.

“Yes and no. Yann knows that my last relationship ended not so well.”

“You can say so.” Eliott cut in on Emma but she just screwed up her eyes and continued.

“But he doesn’t know the details. He is not pushing me into saying anything and I appreciate that a lot. I am not ready to talk about it, not just at the beginning of our relationship.”

“But at least you told him about the cheating, right?” Eliott had to ask about it. He still wasn’t over with the shit Emma went through last Christmas. He even blamed himself for it and deep down he knew it was ridiculous but remembering about Emma weeks after break up, her constant tears, blaming herself, lack of sleep, Eliott still pricked his conscience from time to time.

By the lack of the answer, he guessed that she kept it from Yann. Eliott closed his eyes for a second and took a deep breath.

“He should know that you are still hurt and she was one of the biggest assholes in the whole world. I am sure that you would want to know if he..”

“Eliott, stop. Again, I am not you; I am not so open about everything that I am going through. I admire you for your honesty about your feelings but I am not like that so please, stop pushing.”

Eliott felt that he crossed the line a bit. The case of the breakup was still so painful for Emma and he should be more supportive in her new relationship, not mentioning the old scars.

“I’m sorry, Em.” He apologized and after pulling up near to the girl, he hugged her tightly. “I am an asshole, sorry.”

“I still love you, Boo. Even when you are an asshole.” She wrinkled her nose a bit and they stayed in the embrace for a little while. “So, maybe you can show me your nighttime masterpiece.” Emma demanded, getting up and cleaning from the table.

Right away Eliott could feel the tension on his neck. He wasn’t fond of being a liar but in this case, he would keep this secret for himself. “I haven’t finished it yet and you know that I’m not showing my work when it’s not done.” And he lied, immediately feeling horrible but he had no choice, or he said so to himself.

Emma just rolled her eyes and Eliott could definitely hear that she said ‘weird-ass’ but at least she dropped the topic, so for now, the boy was safe. 

Later that day, after about three or four hours, he kicked Emma out from his apartment, and by kicking out it means that Eliott literally begged her to stay at his place for the rest of the day because sitting alone wasn’t in his Saturday schedule. He wanted her company a little bit longer, but as she stated, ‘being an official girlfriend put some rules on her’ and that was how Eliott happened to call Sofiane, one of his friends slash co-workers.

“Hello, Eliott.” The greeting didn’t sound like Sofiane. “It’s Imane, Sofiane went to the shop, he will be back soon, should I pass something to him?” The girl asked politely.

“Oh, hi Imane. No, no worries. It’s nothing. Enjoy your night.” Eliott ended the call before the girl could ask about anything else.

He lay on the floor of his bedroom and thought about his friends, completely in love and in happy relationships. One could think that being surrounded but most couples would bring Eliott down, at least a bit, but it was the opposite. He was truly happy for all his friends or even people that he only worked with. He loved to see and be surrounded by people in love. It sounded silly but Eliott loved _love_.

His phone rung, putting a stop button to his thoughts, and when he picked it up, he heard his mother voice.

“Hi Boo, why didn’t you call me back? I had to call Emma and I think I’ve interrupted her in something, she was gasping so loudly.” Eliott chuckled under his nose because he just knew in what his mother interrupted Emma and he couldn’t understand how it was possible that she answered the phone. Okay, maybe he knew it was some of his mother’s magic that people are always picking calls from her, of course except her one and only son.

“Sorry mama, I slept till afternoon and completely forgot to check my phone. Sorry.”

“You picked up now so it’s okay. Do you fancy some mama’s dinner tonight or you have some plans already?” Eliott could hear hope in her voice and even if he had some plans, he would cancel it right away, he just couldn’t say no to his mama.

“I’ll be at yours in an hour.”

The woman shouted quick ‘love you’ before Eliott hung up and after that he started to search one of his latest work. He finally found it, under the pile of paper sheets, some paints, a way too much brushes and his sketchbook.

He worked at this yesterday morning and it also was one of the catalysts that push him to write his letter. That’s why seeing that one abandon sunflower under the box meant something very meaningful to Eliott and that’s why he knew that it was _the_ letterbox. The canvas that he just found had a bunch of sunflowers on the blue-greenish background; he put too much paint so it looks like a 3D painting. Eliott smiled, skimming the surface of the paint. His mama would gonna love it.

Just the second before walking out from the apartment Eliott looked outside the window and judged his chances to be caught by the rain again. He decided that wasn’t happening to him this time and without worrying about searching for an umbrella, he went to catch a train.

His mama was waiting for him outside the door, sitting on a bench and playing with her cat. Eliott kissed his mama and petted Mike, the one-eyed cat on the head.

“I hope you’re hungry because as always, I overdo myself.” Eliot and Gabrielle went into the house, and right after them Mike ran to the kitchen and jumped on the counter. “Not even think about it, Eliott.” The woman warned when her son wanted to give a snack to a cat. “He just ate.”

Eliott and Mike looked at her with identical expression and she just laughed. “He can sense that you’re here to spoil him.” Gabrielle joked, putting the food on the table. Eliott smiled to himself and fed the cat, the pleasure on Mike’s little muzzle was clearly visible.

“I have something for you.” The boy said, after washing his hands under the kitchen sink. “I painted it yesterday morning. I hope you like it.” He put out the small canvas form his backpack and handed it to his mother. She was speechless, covering her mouth with the right hand, she was trying to prevent tears appearing in her eyes but she didn’t fully succeed because Eliott had to wipe one of the tears away from her cheek.

“I love it. The sunflowers, you know ...” She didn’t end her sentence, just hugged Eliott and kissed him on the forehead. “I’m going to hang it in the hall. Every guest deserves to see this masterpiece.”

After hearing all the praises, Eliott curled himself a bit, as if he was five years old boy again, too shy to receive such words with pride.

“So, guessing by my call to Emma I bet she’s with that boy. Yann, right?” Gabrielle raised her brows in a meaningful way and Eliott just put his head on the table with a loud groan.

“Mama.” He yelled and the woman just laughed.

After the dinner, they sat on the couch with Mike between them, and they were watching some silly marvel movie that of course Gabrielle chose. Eliott wasn’t into all the ‘hero’ stuff which was completely outrageous in his mother’s opinion.

He didn’t even realize when his eyelids become heavier and heavier and the last thing he remembered before going to sleep, was a gentle kiss on his head and the touch of a blanket on his body.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *drumrolls* So here she is!! The first chapter is with us!!  
> Okay, jokes aside, I hope you enjoyed it and I'm very open for your opinion, guys ^^  
> See you next week! :) 
> 
> Tumblr: https://caro-jtm.tumblr.com/ask
> 
> Ps. Sadly AO3 hasn't any different fonts and I'm deeply troubled by it but well, italics has to be enough for me.


	3. Deux

Who would have thought that after staying until three in the morning, without drinking coffee and with only half of the sandwich for breakfast Eliott would be exhausted at eleven in the morning already? Who would have thought?

For sure not Eliott and now he was literally at the edge of sleep, barely keeping his eyes open. He was so inspired lately that he just couldn’t go to sleep with ease, he had to work, had to create and of course it resulted in lack of sleep and proper nutrition and lack of energy at his work. Moreover, it was only Tuesday, and only his first day at work this week. He couldn’t imagine working for two more days and still be sleep deprived.

“Are you okay?” Leon, the main manager of the gallery asked when Eliott almost dropped his head on the counter because he was seriously barely alive.

“Great. Amazing.” The younger one answered right away, rubbing his eyes.

“Tough night, huh?” The other guy kept the conversation and at this moment Eliott would give everything to be left alone. The gallery was almost empty. It was freaking eleven in the morning, the beginning of the week, it was obvious that he wouldn’t have much work but his supervisor was into some unnecessary chit chats that day and Eliott was barely conscious to stay kind and talkative.

“Sooo, Eliott.” The guy stretched the last sound and it meant that it wasn’t just some chit chat so Eliott straightened himself on the chair and took all of his strength to look directly at Leon. “You went mia this weekend, not answering any of my calls and yesterday I completely forgot to call you so I am asking now. Are you free on Friday evening? Some fat car rented our gallery at last minute so we need as many hands as it’s possible to arrange everything and change the display, for sure.” 

“Yeah, okay. No problem.” Eliott nodded and smiled slightly, being almost unconscious of what he just agreed on, he was barely awake and keeping fake smile was more exhausting than he thought. “Great, be here at two, the event starts at six and I’m predicting that it will end after midnight. And don’t worry, you’ll get some extra cash.” This time the boy was only able to nod his head. The second Leon disappeared behind the column, Eliott put his head on the desk and closed his eyes. He knew he shouldn’t have stayed awake for so long on Sunday and Monday nights but the urge to create was stronger than sleep, he just couldn’t help himself. Finally, Eliott realized what he just did. He was literally craving to Friday, to have a day off and spend it only on sleeping, and of course for next creative day but he chose to go to work and spend way too many hours surrounded by some snobs. Of fuckin course he did this. Eliott only groaned on his stupidity.

At four o’clock Sofiane came to work, all smiley and as tons of butterflies were flying around him.

“Hello sunshine.” He smacked Eliott in his arm because the boy had his eyes close again. During the last two hours, only two people came to the gallery and fortunately they already knew their destination so they only asked Eliott about Leon and this was his job for today.

“Give me some of your energy man, I am literally dying.”

Sofiane laughed, sitting on the chair next to Eliott.

“Impossible, this is the one and only ‘love for Imane’ energy and I cannot share this with anyone.” Eliott smiled hearing his friend. Seeing Sofiane so cheerful was really hopeful, it boosted Eliott’s mood even though his body was screaming for some sleep. “You’re gonna feel it too when you will fall in love.” The dark-haired boy added, patting Eliott on his thigh. He chuckled under his nose because immediately he thought about the letter and what happened to it if somebody found it or threw it without reading. Who knew?

“Hello my lovely boys.” Emma stepped into the gallery and she gave a quick kiss to Sofiane’s and Eliott’s cheeks. “What are you doing here?” The latter asked, trying to keep his yawn.

“I was at Yann’s job, he works close to your place, and I thought I am gonna drop in and say hi.” Emma said, with the same grin as Sofiane some time ago.

“You both are so in love.” Eliott said with dreamy voice and he rested his head on his palm, shifting his eyes from one friend to the other.

“Shush, we’re not going to talk about my amazing love life, I have a real reason to be here,” Emma answered, ignoring the sleepy boy. “I and Yann decided that since we are official, our friends should bond a bit so we are having a little gathering at mine on Friday.”

“No go.” Eliott stated quickly because he clearly remembered that on Friday he would work and he couldn’t ditch his job for Emma’s party. He was just a poor student, he needed extra money, and what’s more, he couldn’t say no to Leon and excuse himself that he wasn’t thinking when he agreed on taking extra hours.

“Oh you fucker, that party is mostly for you to get to know Yann better!” Emma pouted, leaning on the counter. “I thought it’s for all of your friends.” Sofiane broke in but the girl just waved her hand through the air. “I am sure your painting, creating and I don’t know what else making session can be postponed to Saturday. Boo, please.” Again, she tried to make the saddest face as she was able to do but Eliott just smiled at it.

“Sorry Ems, I have to work on Friday.”

“Do I have to work?” Sofiane asked, being a bit lost. “I don’t know, ask Leon. He said we have some last-minute party and that’s why they need me, he didn’t say anything about you.”

“Ekhem.” Emma theatrically cleared her throat and put a palm on the counter. “You both are dumb or what?” Eliott and Sofiane looked at her with confusion. “Madam Philippine Borgès, my one and only mother, the woman that pushed me out to this world is surprise surprise, the owner of this place. She will give you a day off without a problem, trust me.” Emma winked at them, or at least she tried to do so but she just closed and opened her eyes, making both boys chuckled a bit.

“No Ems, you won’t do this. Leon asked me and I agreed so sorry, but I will bond with Yann some other time.” The girl pouted again but said nothing.

“Okay, so you really do not care about any of your friends, except Eliott.” Sofiane disrupted the short moment of silence and Emma, with a cheeky smile, pointed fingers guns at the boy.

“You got me, boi. Now, Eliott, my fave one, get your ass up, we’re going for dinner.” The man, instead of answering just yawned. “First, coffee.” He said with a sleepy voice. “Oh, and Sof, call Miss Clérisseaua before six, we have to know how many paintings she wants to exhibit.”

“Sure do.” Eliott hugged the other boy and in the next minute, he and Emma were out from the gallery.

“I told Yann.”

The girl said right before they went into the coffee shop. “Told what?” Eliott asked, glancing at fortunately not so long queue before them, he couldn’t focus on anything than the scent of coffee beans and the warmth that he could feel in this cozy place.

“About her,” Emma stated firmly but still avoiding saying the name of her ex-girlfriend. “About all the shit I went through because of her.”

This was Eliott’s turn to order but when he looked at Emma and right after the barista, he couldn’t verbalize any word.

“Anything for you, pretty boy?” The guy from the other side of the counter asked, looking at Eliott curiously. “Emm…” “Oh, did I take your breath away?” The waiter, pretty handsome, red-haired boy with a lot of freckles on his face asked another question and Eliott could sense that Emma, standing beside him was so close to bursting into laughter. “Two large double latte macchiato, please.” The blue-greyish eyed boy answered with a bit confused voice, trying to avoid looking at the barista. Luckily, they didn’t have to wait long for their coffees and somebody else gave them the order.

Right after they were out of the coffee shop, Emma couldn’t stop herself and bust up so loud that some of the other pedestrians glanced at her with flak. “He tried to flirt with you! I mean, he clearly did.” She stated as if Eliott wasn’t aware of it. He shook his head, trying to brush it off and close this topic fast but of course, his very best friends had some other idea.

“Why didn’t you flirt back? You will definitely get his number, or rather he would ask yours but the point is, you’ll get a date!”

“Ems, please.” Eliott sighted, sitting on the first free bench that he saw when they entered the park.

“Boo, please. When did you have your last date? Do you even remember what it means to go on a date?” The boy could only roll his eyes. For most of the time, Emma wasn’t very pushy when it comes to Eliott’s love life but every now and then, she was trying to be the matchmaker and hook up Eliott with every eligible human in Paris. 

“I am okay with me and only me, so stop playing fairy godmother, okay?” the boy slurped his drink to the bottom, wishing to make an end to this topic.

“I know sometimes you are not okay Eliott, you are in love with your imagination of love and it’s just not okay Boo. If you don’t want to be in a relationship, it’s okay but, and don’t even try to deny that we both know that you want to be in love but for now you are just imagining how it could be. If you ask me, you should keep your eyes open, not only focus on your canvas or videos.” This time Emma’s voice sounded really concerned. Eliott wasn’t sure how to react to her speech, maybe she was right, maybe he was only in love with the idea of perfect love and in truth, in his twenty-one year’s life, he had never experienced the _real_ love, even the painful one as Emma’s in her previous relationship. That remained Eliott the thing that she told him before they entered the coffee shop.

“So, you told Yann?” He asked, wishing that his friend wouldn’t continue the subject of his love life.

“Yup, I thought about the things you said the other day and I realized that I want to be completely honest with Yann. I really _really_ like him, I don’t wanna mess it up because of my trauma.”

“You’re not gonna mess it up, Ems and Yann is so damn lucky guy to have you.” Eliott reassured the girl and embrace her into his right side of his body; she nuzzled to his neck and chuckled a bit.

“Love you, Boo.”

“Love you too, Ems.” The boy put a kiss on the top of the brown-haired head and they stayed in this position for a while. His eyes have started wandering around the pavement, looking at the fast-moving shoes, black and white, kicks and heels, passing so fast that it was hard just to catch one special pair. Nobody stopped their pace or even slowed down. Eliott could feel how those people had to be absorbed in their minds, completely forgetting about the surrounding world, he wished that maybe somebody would appreciate the beauty of The Bois de Vincennes and just stop for a moment. When his sight jumped on a pair of sparkly martens, right behind them Eliott noticed a ridiculous pair of Nikes, the one with Christmas pattern, with snowmen and gingerbreads. Who would wear Christmas pattern shoes in the middle of September, or well, ever? Eliott started to shift his sight from shoes to legs of the owner of the most awful Nikes that Eliott has ever seen, and he couldn’t even get the chance to glance at the mystery man face because the shoes have started dancing around the street, among other fast walking shoes, completely not giving a shit about anything else and Eliott couldn’t stop looking at them, smiling softly because it was definitely so damn endearing. Those ridiculous shoes knew their moves and they were even able to dance without kicking or bumping into any other pair. Eliott felt that his smile grew wider and wider so he has decided that he had to see the face of this adorable person but when he finally reached the head, which didn’t take long because surprisingly or not that man wasn’t very tall, he could see only the back of the grey hoodie. Eliott was repeating in his mind just three words ‘turn around, turn around, please please, turn around’, wishing that he could get a full view to get a proof that not only the moves were adorable but also a face, unfortunately, he only got a glimpse of a smile of a mystery man when he heard his friend’s voice and felt she was moving from his side. 

“I’m hungry, what are we gonna eat?” Emma asked, disrupting Eliott’s staring session and he really wanted to groan because how dare she?! However, he knew he had to stay cool. 

“Whatever you want.” He answered, still not fully aware of the surrounding world. When he glanced at the place when he lost the sight of this boy, he was already gone. All the opportunity to stare at probably gorgeous man lost because of Emma’s hunger. 

“So sushi!” Emma shouted and grabbed Eliott’s hand without further asking and when they were near to the park exist he again glanced over his shoulder but all he saw were sad pedestrians. 

****

On Friday morning, Eliott was barely alive. On Tuesday, he thought he was exhausted but what he felt right before heading to his job on the last of the workday was a thousand times worse. He thought that only the will of survival and not wanting to be hit by a car or even bump into someone made his eyes open. In truth, the almost bumping already happened when Eliott was at the door of his tenement, he nearly knocked down the postal worker when he was opening the exit.

“Hello Eliott, I have some things for you.” The guy said, sounded happy even though Eliott didn’t greet him well.

“I am sorry Victor but I’m in a rush, you have to leave it in my box.” He didn’t even wait for an answer, just went out from the building and headed to his job.

Ten minutes before two in the afternoon, Eliott entered the main hall of the gallery and he already could feel that this evening would be a mess. Leon was shouting at someone on the phone, Penelope was talking with three interns that they supposed to arrange all the chairs on the right side of the main room, not on the left one. Eliott was completely surprised by the view of Sofiane near to the counter. The boy wanted to say something to Eliott but the phone rang and the men just nodded at each other.

“Great, Eliott, you are finally here. I have to take care of these dummies so you’ll be responsible for changing the exhibition. Some people are already taking the previous one down so just stick to my list and place the new sculptures as I directed, okay?” Penelope has started talking so fast that Eliott needed a minute to comprehend all the words that flew from her mouth. 

“Yes, sure, old to go, new to put in the right place. Got it.” He answered shortly but the woman didn’t even pay attention to his response, just gave him the piece of paper and disappeared along with the three interns in the hall 

Eliott turned to his co-workers who were taking care of the old exhibition and he also has started helping them. In the meantime Sofiane greeted him, and explained that he was at work only till the beginning of the rave, and then he would be gone to Emma’s party. Boys didn’t have time for more talk because they could feel the creeps on their backs when Leon was looking at them. 

Three hours later everything was done and Eliott had to change his clothes for a more proper and elegant one than his tracksuit and the black hoodie. He put on a buttoned white shirt and black pants. Nice and simple. Eliott left all his stuff in the workers’ room, like the rest of the people that they were staying for the night, and he went back to the hall. Penelope went missing for a while and she was the one that supposed to give him the list with the price of the art so he stuck with nothing to do for a bit. Seeing how much Leon was stressed, Eliott could sense that the people who would come, weren’t just a simple ‘liking artsy things’ humans but rather the one that wouldn’t buy anything too cheap. And that meant that he would have some paperwork but he was there for this so no complaints this time. 

Right before the beginning of the night he saw Emma’s mum but she was able only to give Eliott a cheek kiss because Penelope, who was finally found and gave Eliott paper with the table, called the Philippine so Eliott stayed alone at his counter. 

As he predicted, all the party people were completely boring, as they had sticks in their asses. Eliott was giggling whenever he saw Leon who tried to impress every person with his smart talk and try to fit with these people. The boy couldn't understand that guy, Leon wasn’t very much of Eliott’s kind of person but he was a likable one, with a nice sense of humor but when he was around rich people something weird was happening with him, something that Eliott would never understand. 

He heard that the host of the party has started his speech so Eliott got a few minutes for himself. He took out his phone from the back pocket and has started scrolling through Instagram. Of course he got the message from Emma, okay four messages, with the same request that Eliott has to come to her party and he just answered with short ‘hun fun ;)’.

He was back to looking at the photos of his friends and he stuck with the one that Emma posted not so long ago. She was there with Yann and some anonymous guy. Eliott could feel that he saw him somewhere but nothing was coming to his mind. He zoomed the photo and he must admit that this boy had the purest and perfect blue eyes that even on such not so great photo that Emma posted, Eliott could notice that amazing color and the first word came to Eliott’s mind was innocent. This boy was beautiful and innocent. 

He needed a moment to change his focus on the caption of the pic and when he saw it, he took a screenshot, cropped the photo that only words were visible and send it to Emma with the text ‘already replaced me, huh?’ and he stuck with looking at his phone, waiting for an answer but not only half a minute passed when he heard that somebody near to his counter was quietly clearing a throat. 

“Oh, excuse me. Can I help you with something?” Eliott stood up, placing his phone upside down on the desk but when he saw the face in front of him, the boy just groaned. 

“Happy to see me, right.” The man said and Eliott was stopping himself from spitting on this guy’s shoes. The latter wasn’t a violent person but by seeing this guy, Eliott was absolutely seething. 

“What are you doing here, Charles?” He could finally ask, without the urge to start a fight right in the middle of the workplace. Of course violence wasn’t an answer but Charles deserved to be punched in his rich, stupid face.

“I’m one of the guests, as you can guess.” He pointed on his glass of wine and smirked as he always did. “How are you? When will you have your display, hm? 

Eliott couldn’t believe in this guy. After all, that happened last year he had all the guts to make a normal conversation with him, without even a bit of guilt visible on his annoying face. 

“Sorry but as you can see I’m working, so no time for chit chats.” Eliott responded as politely as he could and he focused his view on the monitor of the laptop. 

“Is Emma here?” Charles asked, completely ignoring Eliott’s attempts to stop this unnecessary talk. 

Eliott bit his tongue from preventing saying anything stupid that somebody would hear. He took a deep breath and looked straight into Charles’ eyes. 

“If you have no intentions to buy any of the sculpture, simply go away and be an asshole towards other people, okay?” 

Charles didn’t respond to this, just chuckled under his nose but he went somewhere so Eliott didn’t have to look at his stupid face anymore. This short conversation with the douche completely wound Eliott up but he had to remain calm and gentle for the rest of the night so he took a deep breath and sat on his chair. He couldn’t let himself be so affected by Asshole Munier. 

Luckily, the douche didn’t appear in front of Eliott’s eyes till the end of the party. A few guests came to him and bought almost all the sculptures out. Clicking the prices on the keyboard and seeing the number of zeros was definitely shocking for Eliott, even though it wasn’t the first time he saw such prices. When the party was coming to an end and he knew he wouldn’t have more work to do, he sat on the chair and let his thoughts wandering around if, someday, his art would also reach such prices as the one that he sold, or at least the half of that rate. The idea of people buying his stuff was completely out of this world. His parents and friends were asking Eliott about his first exhibition and they really believed in him, from time to time even Eliott believed in himself but still, selling his art for such rate was inconceivable for the boy. 

“Eliott, you can go home.” Penelope’s voice brought Eliott to reality. He smiled at her and in five minutes he was again in his tracksuit and hoodie, heading to his house. 

It was right before midnight and he was sure that Emma’s party was still on so he could go to hers but he was too tired to deal with a bunch of drunk people and the only thing that he could think about was his bed, or maybe quick sketching and then, going to bed. 

As befit for Friday’s nights in Paris, streets were full of people, wandering around the city with significant others, drinking in bars with friends and Eliott saw a small group of teenagers running and dancing around the fountain. He could feel pure happiness and even though the surroundings were loud and full of people, the inner peacefulness that he experienced at that moment was completely opposite to what was happening around the Parisian streets. 

After a few minutes, he reached his tenement and when he was already at the second floor, he realized that Victor, the mailman, left something in his letterbox so he went down and took all the contents out of it, too tired to check the amount of the bills and some advertisements he just put it in his pocket and went to the apartment.

His bedroom was completely dark so the boy turned on one of his lamps and after making a green tea, took a quick shower. 

His last work, halfway done canvas full of blue flowers, was laying on his desk. Eliott was wiping his hair with the towel and looking at his painting. Lately, the obsession about flowers has risen and he must admit that was proud of was he was making. It wasn’t perfect, the balance of the color still wasn’t as Eliott would imagine and he needed to buy more paint and definitely more canvas, and the thought of how much money he would spend when the new university semester will start was absolutely frightening but looking at what he could do with his own hands and only because his imagination was fairly broad made him joyful and peaceful. 

Eliott sat on the chair, with an attempt to end his work but he felt under his butt the hoodie and something rustled inside of it. The boy took all the papers that he got from the box, starting to check which bill is the most urgent to pay but surprisingly, the first envelope wasn’t a bill. On the front page Eliott could see his address and the small stamp with the Eiffel Tower image.

Curiosity reached its peak and Eliott, very gently, opened the envelope and inside he found a folded piece of paper and when he unfolded it, he couldn’t believe his eyes.

He got the answer. Somebody really answered for his love letter and just for one second Eliott put the paper on the desk, the boy wasn’t sure if he wanted to know what that person wrote. He hesitated only for a minute and he took the letter back to his hands. 

_Dear Verginius,_

_You have no idea how weird I feel, writing this letter. I bet you weren’t so stressed during writing yours, reading it felt so smooth and peaceful that I am sure you did this in ten minutes. I am still not sure about creating this answer because I am one hundred percent sure that your letter wasn’t targeted to me (I don’t know any Verginius, and by the way that name is so cool!), but I’ve decided that I will write to you just to inform you that the letter missed the owner and now I am not sure what should I do._

_I know your address, and I bet you could get that if you are reading this, so I could just go to your place and put the letter in your box but something is stopping me or maybe I am too scared that you would catch me and I have no idea what would have happened but I am just terrified of many things, mostly because my brain is telling me stupid things, not because something bad will happen to me in reality. But it’s a human thing to overanalyzing everything, right? I hope you’re nodding, I really like when people are agreeing with me._

_The important thing, I am so sorry that I read your letter. I get if you are angry at me, I would be pissed at myself for doing this, for sure. And sorry for not apologizing at the beginning of this letter but this is the only nice piece of paper I have at home right now and I know I should’ve thought through everything at first but I am not a very organized person, as many people can say._

_So, again. I am deeply sorry for reading it but still, I have to admit that it was beautiful. Your words were completely honest and pure and whoever is your love, I hope that person treats you right._

_But I also have some doubts because even though you were talking to your love, I had the feeling as you still don’t know that person. Am I right? Because if I am (and it would be awesome to be right about something for once) your letter would be even more amazing. Because if you still don’t know the person that you love, I just cannot imagine the love that you will give that person when you will meet them. This is the kind of love that people only can get from movies and books, so it’s not real. And I have a feeling that maybe you are not real either._

_What if this is some kind of social experiment, and a group of people wrote a bunch of love letters, sent them to random citizens and they are waiting for responses?_

_If you are a group of people making some weird social experiment, shame on you! Shame on you for making me tear up because of this letter!_

_But Verginius, if you are just you, thank you. I want to keep your letter but I am sure that you want to get it back so just write to me about what I should do. Remember that I am not keen on meeting face to face._

_I wish you all the best and if I was right, I hope you will find your love as soon as it’s possible._

_~~Love,~~ _ _Kind regards_

_P. Parker_

Eliott read the letter multiples times until he finally realized that it was true. He wasn’t sure what he supposed to do so he just has started wandering around his room, being completely awake, forgetting about any kind of tiredness. It would be impossible to just go to sleep after reading this letter, Eliott needed to do something but he still was too deep in shock to think straight and remain calm. 

The boy opened the balcony doors and lighted a cigarette but he didn’t even draw on it, just threw to the cigarette jar, which always was placed on the terrace and he took a deep breath. 

What he should do? He had to respond or maybe just remain silent. Oh, of course, he couldn’t do that. 

The person that send him that letter was a real human, who spent the time to write an answer and that person was so polite, even apologizing for reading Eliott’s text, which made the boy melt inside because it seemed for him too pure to be such kind even through a letter. 

Eliott wrote his letter to be read by somebody so the only right thing to do was writing another one. 

The boy closed the balcony doors and still a little bit too excited sat near to his desk and took out one piece of paper and black pen. 

“Eliott, stay calm.” He ordered himself aloud and after a short glance at withered sunflower, he switched his focus on writing. 

_Dear P. Parker,_

_I am definitely not mad at you, my aim in writing my first letter was that it supposed to be read by somebody and you have no idea how happy I am that it really happened. And I can assure you, I am just me, not some group of people who came up with a weird social experiment. And by the way, don’t you think it would be a great idea? People would be surprised but I am sure that ninety percent of them would appreciate that. Nowadays nobody writes letters, right? (Except me and you, so it seems ;) ) It would be nice if we added a bit of amazement into our lives. Or at least to mine, I think I become too boring. And I’ve just realized how sad it sounds because I am in my twenties and I am already a bit bored with myself. That doesn’t sound very promising for my future._

_Or maybe it is not about boredom but something ‘missing’. It’s so frustrating to name that something but, in fact, I really don’t know. My life lacks something and I’m still trying to figure out what exactly I am looking for._

_I hope you conjectured already from the very first sentence of this letter that I wrote the previous one just to anybody, so yes, your guess was right. I haven’t found my love, yet. I just wanted to finally produce in a few coherent sentences what I would say to that person If I ever found them. All of that stuck in me for too long and the kind of relief I felt after writing it was just indescribable._

_You don’t have to give me my letter back. I am feeling better with the thought that a real human read and possessed it, as long as you wish of course._

_I hope it’s okay to ask what your name is because it’s a bit hard to guess it only by a letter P and I don’t want to assume anything by using the surname ‘Parker’. By this, I could only say that you are a Spider-Man fan and it’s so ridiculous because he is also one of my mama’s favorites marvel heroes and I hope you won’t be disappointed when I will admit that I am not a huge fan of any superhero movies._

_But don’t worry, I am not blighting our acquaintanceship because of this. Or maybe I should be worried that you would blight me? I hope that won’t happen and if you want you can correspond with my mama, she would be pleased to have someone to talk with about this weird marvel stuff._

_I completely forgot to thank you, I should’ve done this at the beginning of the letter but I wrote so much and it’s so late and I am too tired to rewrite it. I hope you could forgive me. So, dear P, thank you so much and I am sorry even more._

_I wish you all the best and I hope I’ll hear from you soon. Very soon._

_Love,_

_Verginius._

Eliott leaned on the back of the chair and run his fingers through already messy hair. He laughed so happily and freely as if he just talked with the mysterious P and as if he knew that person already. It was completely insane but even though, still felt right. 

The boy didn’t even check the time, just took his jacket and with a phone in his one hand and letter in the other, went out from his apartment with the specific aim in his head. 

Eliott was wandering around among almost empty streets, this time more silent so it must have been already very late, or very early, and after a few minutes he realized that he wasn’t even sure if he took the right way. He stood up dead stop, looking around with the hope that maybe the known cat would be walking around this street but unfortunately Eliott could see only a few people around him. 

The boy took a deep breath, closed his eyes and was trying to remember which streets he was walking a few days ago and the sound of opening doors, the same sound as that time, was heard behind him but this time when he turned around, he noticed two boys, giggling and walking, or rather trying to walk because Eliott could guess right away that they were completely wasted. 

But the couple wasn’t important for him this time. He glanced at the doors that he was able to stop before closing and made sure that, indeed, it was the right one. 

When Eliott turned on the lights in the hall he still could hear a few laughs of the boys and some whispers which sounded as ‘shh, fuck somebody is coming’ and ‘stop taking your pants here’ but when Eliott looked at the letterbox number 7 all noises went silent. Without further thinking he put his letter inside and smiled, as he won a lottery. 

And when he went outside on the streets the rain has started raining but nothing could ruin his mood at that moment and Eliott already started to count how many minutes would pass till he would get a new letter. 


	4. Trois

__

_Dear Verginius,_

_Is it weird that I am glad you don’t want your letter back? I hope it’s not but if it is, just tell me (ha, I’m such a joker, oh, by the way, have you watched that movie? I’m predicting that you haven’t because you’re against marvel, (HOW DARE YOU?! (yeah, I just did brackets in the bracket of the bracket, don’t judge me)) but maybe you are just not into hero movies and joker well, is not that kind of a movie (if you’re gonna tell me that you have no idea about ‘Joker’ then I’m gonna think about ending writing letters to you, so better deeply consider your answer and catch up with some watching, just in case))._

_Wow, so I am a real mess, you could’ve totally skipped the first part of my letter. Sorry for all the mumbling, or maybe I am not sorry? I don’t know but I feel good writing all my thoughts to you, I have almost zero clues about what kind of person you are in reality but you just have to be a good person because bad people are not writing letters as you did. And I have to disagree with your idea about sending a letter to some randoms, I mean maybe I am not exactly against that idea but about people responses, you have too much faith in them and I think I am the pessimistic one in this relation because in my opinion ninety percent wouldn’t answer for any letter or even they would make fun of it. People are horrible horrible creatures sometimes. The idea that I am the only one that you’re writing such letters is so mitigatory and I don’t wanna ruin my imagination about being the chosen one. (Ha, another movie reference, but I hope I don’t have to write it in capital letters, just answer in your next letter ;) )_

_And don’t worry about being a bit bored (or something ;) ) with your own life, I am also in my twenties and sometimes I am feeling like that too. Even though I am working and studying, sometimes even traveling with my friends (don’t be fooled by this, I am the shitty poor student, ha) and I am enjoying my life pretty much but still, sometimes I am realizing that I am missing some huge part of my life and I have no clue what exactly it is. As you described it, it’s frustrating. This is kind of emptiness inside me like I can even feel my soul that it craves for something and I really wanna reach that something, grab it into my hands and finally say ‘yes, I am truly happy now’ but each time that desirable thing is slipping through my fingers and I’m remaining blank, trying to catch a proper breath because all the struggle makes me forget how to breathe._

_So yeah, I am still not sure if this is something familiar to what exactly you are experiencing but you shouldn’t think that you are alone with this. We are not alone in this world anymore._

_Okay, I have to confess something. I am so damn hangover and probably I shouldn’t write anything in such state but after writing the first letter I am checking my box every day and I even told my roommate to not check the box and I am the only one that has access to it so when I saw that you wrote another letter for me, I couldn’t stop myself and now I am writing, probably completely incoherent and such messy thoughts that I cannot catch up with all of them. Sorry V, I hope you will find it amusing, not repulsive._

_I think I should stop right here, my brain works horribly right now and I can sense that I’ll pass out right after putting this letter in an envelope._

_I hope you are gonna keep writing to me, I really like this feeling of excitement when I’m opening my box and I can see a letter that is from you and only for me._

~~_Love,_ ~~ _Kind regards,_

_P. Parker_

_PS. Let’s call me Peter, I am a boy so stick with the Spider-Man persona._

Eliott could literally feel that his face was hurting a bit because he was staring at the letter for so long and simultaneously grinning completely out of control of his mouth but he couldn’t just stop doing this. His new friend was probably the most endearing person that he ever met, or well, read but that wasn’t a point. The point was that somebody understood Eliott and it was something incredible and that new feeling of the awareness that somewhere among thousands of Parisians, the person who wrote to Eliott that letter was wandering around without knowledge of how huge impact he had on Eliott was purely beautiful. He wasn’t alone in this world and that was deeply soothing emotion. 

In the exact moment when Eliott picked up a blank paper sheet, his phone started ringing and the boy only rolled his eyes, cursing at himself for not muting the phone before. 

“Hello Ems, what’s up.” Eliott greeted his friend before she could say anything. 

“Eliott, who long you would wait till you would say ‘I love you’ to your partner?” That question was so unexpected that the boy choked on air and it wasn’t exactly about the question but the person that asked it. Emma wasn’t a very romantic girl, as you can say, and when it comes to showing any deeper emotions she always was very cautious about it. After the horrible break up, Eliott noticed that his friend shut herself, even more, when it comes to showing any feelings so he would never expect to hear such sentences from her after a week of starting the official relationship with a new person. 

‘Erm, you know me, Ems, I would scream these words to the person of my dreams after ten seconds when I would realize it so I am not sure if it was something helpful.” Eliott finally answered, changing the position on his chair, putting one leg on the desk and second crossing under his butt, he was trying to find a comfortable position and as always, he couldn’t keep his butt in one place longer than five minutes. 

“Yeah, I knew you would answer something like that.” The girl chuckled a bit but Eliott could sense that something was clearly bothering her. 

“Ems, are you okay? Maybe you wanna drop by, make a proper breakfast for me and stay for some Pixar marathon?” 

“Eliott,” The brunette has started, but before finishing the sentence she just breathed out deeply. “I’ll be at yours in ten.” And then she hung up. 

The boy knew that his letter had to wait. Even though he craved for writing a few sentences to P, he knew that Emma needed him, he would never put anything or anyone before Emma and her needs. She was always there for him and so he was always for her. 

Eliott put the letter from P in the first drawer, under some of his undone work, to make sure that if anybody too meddling would open the drawer, that person wouldn’t find his precious treasure very easily. As if such types of people supposed to visit Eliott’s house but just in case, to not be distracted by the thought of revealing his secret, he decided that hiding it deeper was a proper idea. 

The boy didn’t even have to wait the said ten minutes before Emma appeared at his door and Eliott guessed she was already on her way when she called him. 

“Croissants and black coffee have to be enough for today’s breakfast.” The girl spoke before Eliott could lean and kissed her on the cheek. “I am totally not in the cooking mood today.” She added, passing the boy and with a huge groan literally throwing herself on his bed, which Eliott still didn’t make so between the not really comfortable sofa and huge bed it was obvious which one Emma would choose. 

“Should I ask or you need some time?” The boy inquired, sitting on the edge of the mattress and caressing Emma’s back. He heard only some mumbling because she placed her face onto the pillow and Eliott could predict that one more minute and his friend would be out of the air, and he preferred to get the information that put Emma in such a devastating state. 

“Ems,” Eliott poked Emma’s in her arm but in reply, she groaned and moved her face slightly towards Eliott just to catch a breath. “Hey Ems, tell me what’s going on.” The boy lowered his voice and after a few seconds of silence he also placed himself on his stomach, near to his friend. 

“Eliott, I love him.” Emma whispered, not looking at Eliott just wandering her sight on his t-shirt and white sheets on the bed. The boy smiled warmly because even though Emma said those words quietly, he could sense the truthness in it. She really meant it and Eliott couldn’t be happier for her at that moment. 

“That’s great Ems” He answered, taking away a few wisps of hair from her face. 

“No, it’s not.” The girl said aloud and firmly, sitting cross-legged on the bed and taking one of the pillows into her hands, trying to hide behind it. “It’s impossible to be sure of loving somebody after such a short time. I shouldn’t feel like this, Eliott.” 

The last sentence sounded so vulnerable that the only thing Eliott could do was to take Emma in his arms and hug her tightly. 

“Ems, you can feel whatever and whenever you want. You cannot be scared of being in love or be loved by someone. And you know what, I am proud of you that you admitted it and very glad that you told me about it. Remember there isn’t any special time to say those words aloud, that you have to wait a month or two or after a year it’s already too late. When we feel something we should express it and when we need some time to say such words aloud, we should give it to ourselves. No pressure, Ginny.” 

“Oh for fuck sake Eliott, you gave such warm pep talk and you had to end it that way. You supposed to cheer me up now, not get on my nerves.” Even though Emma tried to sound serious, Eliott saw a shy smile on her face and it was obvious that she didn’t mind ‘ginny’ nickname, or at least that time. 

“So, are you gonna tell me what exactly happened that you realized how you will always, honestly, truly, completely love Yann?” The guy asked when Emma put her head on his lap. Eliott leaned on the wall, trying to sit comfortably to caress his friend’s hair, which she adored deeply. 

‘Did you just kinda quoted ‘Love, Rosie’?” The girl asked, grinning towards Eliott. 

“Aww, Ems you’ve recognized it. I’m proud.” She just rolled her eyes and the boy responded to it with a nose flick. 

“You’re annoying and I know it only because I watched that movie with your romantic ass about ten times already. I am not a fan of it.” Eliott just laughed at her words because he could clearly remember that every time they were watching it, Emma was trying to hide her face to not show her tears. She was a softy and her attempt to deny it was just cute for Eliott and he would love to make a little bit fun of her because of it but that time he wanted to switch the focus on the main topic that brought Emma to his apartment. 

“So tell me, what happened.” He repeated, knowing that she was aware of what Eliott was talking about. 

“Well, after my party Yann took care of Lucas, he was completely wasted and Yann is even more protective towards Lucas than we’re to each other.” 

“Lucas?” Eliott interrupted, clearly confused by the new character of this story. “Oh yeah, he’s Yann’s best friend, as best of the best. I’ll tell you about him later.” The guy only nodded and was back to playing with Emma’s hair. 

“And when they left I was sure that Yann would be back at his or he would stay with Lucas but when I was cleaning house at damn four in the morning, he was back. He chose to help me with all the mess that he didn’t even make just to be with me and help.” Emma was staring at the ceiling and Eliott could see in her eyes a little tear. She was really moved by such small thing and her eyes were full of amazement that somebody would ever do something like that for her. Eliott wanted to slip his comment that she should’ve got used to such stuff because she deserves the world and it’s normal to be there for people that we care about but that time he decided to remain silent and listen to Emma to the end of her part. 

“And we were cleaning and laughing and he was feeding me with the food that was left and we weren’t even tired after all drinking and partying. We were just enjoying ourselves and I cannot even remember when I was so happy, like happy without you of course.” After the last words she gave back a nose flick to Eliott and the boy just curled it a bit.

“When we went to sleep he spooned me and sorry for saying that but he’s better in this than you.” 

This time Eliott only rolled his eyes because it couldn’t be true. He was the best hugger in the world and always trying to be the best big spoon for Emma. 

“Continue.” He interrupted, seeing that Emma tried to make fun of his reaction but she just poke Eliott’s nose again and was back to her story. 

“When I woke up, Yann wasn’t in bed anymore but he appeared in my room as he sensed that I was already awake. He kissed me and said that he made breakfast be he couldn’t find any tray and that’s why he didn’t bring all the food to bed. So we went to the living room and when he was pouring the coffee I looked at him and realized that I’ve fallen in love with him. That I love Yann and that feeling overwhelmed me so much that I couldn’t say anything and he thought that he did something wrong so I was only able to kiss him and after that we fucked and I’m pretty sure my neighbors heard something but I don’t really care.” 

“So from now on whenever you would want to say ‘I love you’ to Yann, you’ll just have sex with him just to avoid saying those words, right?” Eliott joked, still playing with Emma’s hair and through her talk, she closed her eyes with pleasing facial expression. In response, she just mumbled affirmatively. 

“It’s just too soon for me,” Emma whispered, opening her eyes. “But I couldn’t keep it in myself so I had to tell you.” 

“Whenever you are ready, Ems. Nobody rushes you and you just have to get used to this feeling, and you know, I am always here if you need me.” Eliott kissed the tip of Emma’s nose and she laughed like she was ten years old again. 

For the rest of the day they binge-watched a few movies and had the laziest afternoon ever. Eliott played his playlist of the best Pixar masterpieces, and because they were into friend’s mood he chose Toy Story, all parts of course because in Eliott’s opinion you could not just choose one, and of course, you couldn’t watch something from the middle and watching Toy Story only for the first part was a waste. So they spent six hours with Woody and Buzz, completely forgetting about any outside world and Emma even wrote to Yann that she was spending time with Eliott so she was off for anyone else. 

But even six hours of Pixar’s masterpieces couldn’t hold Eliott back from lurking at his drawer when his little secret was resting. Between short breaks to go to the toilet or Emma’s need to cook something Eliott was formulating every sentence that he would write to P and he imagined what his new friend would respond. It was so new for Eliott and even a little bit scary that he was already so obsessed about P and his opinion on anything, Eliott wanted to know every P’s thought, every judgment and, which was the most important thing, what makes P happy. From now on the only aim of Eliott’s letters was to keep P joyful, to get the feeling that he was all smiles because Eliott was the one that caused P happiness. 

“Eliott,” Emma has started walking around the kitchen during making some cupcakes because as she and Eliott felt, or rather didn’t feel for going out for anything sweet so Emma’s cooking skills were very useful at that moment. The boy only murmured in the answer, not even focusing his sight on his friend, but still looking at the end credits of the last Toy Story movie, still thinking about P. “Do you wanna meet Yann, right?” The girl eventually ended her question and Eliott smiled immediately, shutting his laptop. 

“Of course!” He literally screamed and jumped from the bed to put an aloud kiss on the top of the girl’s head. 

“So prepare yourself, we’re getting lunch together tomorrow.” 

****

In the morning nor Eliott or Emma had any will to get up but Emma’s phone was calling and calling and they couldn’t ignore it for eternity. It turned out that they supposed to meet Yann in thirty minutes and they were still in their pajamas. Eliott knew that it was partially his fault because by trying to distract himself from thinking about P, he decided to improve his cooking skills, which were pretty horrible in Eliott’s opinion and even worse in Emma’s one. They were trying to make a pretty easy cake, black beans brownies and the boy really wanted to do it by himself but of course, he mistook the amount of sugar with the amount of baking soda and after the first failure, Eliott didn’t want to give up so in the end, they had to go out for quick shopping and the boy was so glad to live near to a small grocery shop that was open even on Sunday evenings. After a short walk, when they were back into the apartment, Eliott and Emma were completely absorbed in making everything right that time and before they realized, after the whole preparing, cooking and eating, it was already four in the morning. That was why they were still in bed at eleven on Monday morning. 

After a short talk between Emma and Yann, Eliott and his friend were walking around the apartment, trying to do themselves up but they were still half asleep so it was a bit complicated task but luckily the thought about drinking coffee at the cafe where Yann was waiting for them was making their movements a bit faster. 

“Yann is gonna hate me before even meeting me.” Eliott gasped when they finally left the flat but of course they had to go back because he forgot to close the door and by accident, Emma took Eliott’s shoes, which could explain why she felt as she was wearing kayaks on her feet. 

After almost twenty minutes of delay, because of course, they took the wrong bus, Eliott was finally able to spot Yann sitting at one of the street cafes but he wasn’t alone. When Emma and Eliott approached the table, the first thing Yann did was embracing Emma and kissing her for so long that Eliott was pretty sure both of them forgot that they were surrounded but other people. 

Eliott preferred to change his sight on something different and he could finally see the face of the anonymous person that was sitting with Yann. 

It was the boy from Emma’s Instagram photo but he looked a bit different. His eyes were still amazingly gorgeous and they were even bluer in reality that Eliott could imagine but the bags under them couldn’t be unnoticeable, the boy looked so tired because of them, completely exhausted and by a short second when that man looked straight into Eliott’s eyes, he could see a mix of anger and surrender. Eliott could feel that his heartbeat was a bit faster than normal when the anonymous one looked at him but the feeling was gone as soon as it appeared. 

“Ehm, sorry.” Eliott heard his friend’s voice so he turned around to her with a nice smile, trying to pretend that he wasn’t frozen for a split second by the look of the blue-eyed boy. “Yann, this is Eliott. Eliott this is Yann and the one that doesn’t want to move his ass up it’s Lucas.” She pointed at the boy that was still sitting on the chair without any movement. Eliott hugged Yann, showing his typical affection to the people that he knew by Emma. He felt as if he knew Yann and this boy was his friend already, even without any previous meetings. Eliott did this only because he knew from Emma’s stories that Yann had no problems with showing affection towards anyone and obviously she was speaking about Eliott as much as she could, he was her friend, her brother so how she could resit from talking about him to her new boyfriend, so Yann also sensed that hug wouldn’t be inappropriate. 

Eliott offered his hand to Lucas and boy shook it only for a second but even such short touch made Eliott feel warm on his whole body. He beat his upper lip, doing this completely unconscious but that was his habit when he felt a bit uneasy in any kind of situation. 

“Can we finally order?” Lucas eventually said with such annoyance in his voice that Eliott was taken aback by this for a bit. 

“Erm, yeah sure,” Yann answered looking at Lucas with such sight that even Eliott understood what Yann wanted to express by it. “Ems, the same as always, right?” He asked the girl and she nodded her head completely lost in Yann’s eyes so she didn’t even notice the weird behavior of her new friend. “So, Eliott, check the menu and we’ll be ready to order.” 

“Yeah, take your time as if you weren’t twenty minutes late already.” Lucas said quietly but it was so clear that Eliott supposed to hear this. “Excuse me?” The boy asked completely gobsmacked, he had no idea that he did so much harm to Lucas for being late, and by the way Yann knew about it so what was the problem. The thought of Lucas as innocent and beautiful from the moment he saw him on Emma’s photo was already gone. Or maybe just the innocent one because Lucas remained beautiful, even with such attitude. 

“Lucas.” Yann said with a cautionary voice but he just smirked and shook his head. 

“Sorry guys, I have to go.” The blue-eyed boy stood up and literally stormed out from the cafe and it took only a second to see Yann running after him. 

“Shit.” Emma cursed looking into the direction where her boyfriend ran. 

“Should I ask, be offended or something?” Eliott asked because he was absolutely confused and he had no idea what he should do but before Emma could answer, a young blond waitress came to his table and Emma ordered all the food for her, Yann and even for Eliott, knowing for sure what he would choose. 

“I am so sorry Eliott.” That was the first words Yann phrased when he was back in the cafe. “I thought that meeting with all of us would be good for Lucas but he’s not there yet.” 

“Emm, it’s okay.” Eliott answered, trying to sound as convincing as he could and Yann only smiled at him but it was definitely a sad type smile. Emma glanced at Eliott and he noticed her quick and almost invisible head move so he knew it wasn’t the place and time for any more question. 

“So what Emma baked for you yesterday?” Emma’s boyfriend chuckled pointing at Emma’s shirt with a still visible stain of cocoa. 

And then finally the talk went smoothly. Eliott really felt as he knew Yann for a long long time already. The boy talked a bit about his work, which maybe wasn’t his dream job but at least he worked with stuff that he liked, with instruments. Yann worked in the music shop along with his friend Alexia and her parents were the owners of that place. They talked about music for hour after hour and Emma couldn’t stop rolling his eyes when both of the boys have started praising the love for dubstep and Eliott couldn’t stop making fun of Emma as she tried to hide such important information about Yann from him. As the girl stated, she would be lost at the moment when she would tell Eliott about it and probably Yann would be Eliott’s boyfriend not Emma’s. 

“Yeah, it could end like this.” Yann confirmed and checked out Eliott with such a confident look that the boy could feel the warmth on his cheeks. “If you’re not straight, you know, I am bi so who knows. You’re exceptionally handsome and you adore dubstep. I think those reasons are enough to date, anyone.” Eliott shook his head seeing Emma’s hilarious reaction when she opened her eyes as wide as her mouth and she was so close to saying something but Yann closed her lips with a kiss. “But I am with you baby and I couldn’t be happier. Even if you hate dubstep.” And their sending lovely heart eyes sessions has begun but Eliott hadn’t the heart to stop such adorable moment so he was only smiling at these two lovebirds and he felt pure joy seeing such a delightful couple. Completely unconsciously his thoughts shifted attention to P and when he realized that he was thinking about the boy that Eliott hasn’t even seen, he shook his head because it was ridiculous. They were only writing letters to each other, nothing much. Eliott had to restrain his imagination since he was aware that nothing good would happen with letting his mind wandering around about such things. He couldn’t let himself do that. 

After lovebirds eye-heart session ended, they were finally able to finish their food and when they ate their fill, Yann proposed a walk to his job, he was so excited to show Eliott his workplace and present a bit of his talent, and Emma just commented that the only reason that they were heading to the music store was to let Yann show off but no of them mind it. 

And as Emma spilled a few days ago, Yann’s work was really not so far from Eliott’s gallery. The boy was even a bit surprised that he hadn’t noticed it before but in fact, he was always walking through different streets than they just did so lack of knowledge about Yann’s store wasn’t something unexpected. The shop was placed in an old grey tenement and it looked as it was completely misplaced. Everything in that street looked steady, a bit dull and calm but the music shop was absolutely opposite to the whole area and Eliott had to admit that was definitely an advantage. The Golden Note, the name of the shop was put above the entrance, every letter was sparkly and Eliott couldn’t decide if it was a bit tacky or maybe that the ‘golden mean’ to bring customers in. On the displays, people could see a few types of guitars and other bowed string instruments, and above them, a few saxophones and trumpets were hanged. It looked completely chaotic even from the outside but it has something inviting in all of that disorder. 

When they entered the shop the first thing Eliott noticed was a girl with short brown hair that was talking with two guys standing near to the drums and across from them, close to the counter Eliott saw another woman, a little bit older than the first one. When she noticed the three, she greeted them with a warm smile and she hugged Yann when the boy was near enough to grab him. 

“I thought you aren’t working today, hon.” She said, after letting Yann catch a breath. 

“Yeah, I just wanted to show the shop to Eliott.” He pointed at the boy and Eliott reached out his hand to the woman. 

“I’m Eliott, nice to meet you.” He said politely, and the woman took him completely off the guard, hugging Eliott as tightly as probably Yann a few seconds ago. “Alicia, nice to meet you too.” And after that she grabbed Emma to do the same as she did to the boys. 

“Mom, let her breath,” The group heard a different voice and Eliott immediately turned around. It was the girl that Eliott noticed right after coming into the shop. “And take care of the clients, they want to pay for the full offer.” She pointed at the two guys and her mum focused on them at once. 

“Hi Eliott, I’m Alexia. It’s so nice to finally put a face on the person that I heard so many stories from Emma.” She kissed Eliott on his cheeks and after that the boy looked at Emma with a suspicious sight. 

“What stories did you tell?” 

“Oh come on, you’re practically a saint, what I could tell about you.” The brunette only rolled her eyes and all the four laughed a bit. Eliott didn’t feel like a saint, he wasn’t a one for sure but Emma was always praising him definitely way more than he deserved it. 

“You can try one of the new Gibsons.” Alexia said, bringing Eliott to reality but he realized that she was talking to Yann who already were wandering around the guitar section and right after he heard Alexia, he grabbed the black guitar and he has started tuning it but unfortunately, some new customers came in so with a very disappointed face, he put the guitar where it belongs. 

“Why aren’t you playing?” Eliott asked, looking around at all the instruments that were attached to the wall. 

“When I work I can play a bit more, mainly for the customers but when I have my day off I’m not supposed to play when some clients are here.” Yann pointed at another couple that came to the shop. “The company policy.” He joked, but with gloomy eyes. Emma saw the change of her boyfriend’s mood right away so she placed a kiss on his cheek and took his hand.

Eliott started wandering around the shop, completely ignoring his friends. He frowned his eyebrows when he realized that only now he noticed a big piano standing in the farthest corner of the shop. He couldn’t find any price or any kind of information about the instrument and it even looked as if it was standing there for a long time. One look on the ivories was enough to know that it wasn’t a new piano and what’s more, the name of the producer was a bit shabby. Eliott put his hand on the key but without pressing it. Smiled appeared on his face unconsciously, remembering the time when he was a little kid and his dad played for him. It was a truly magical time. Eliott’s dad always knew when his son wasn’t feeling okay and after being diagnosed with bipolarity, he was keen on improving Eliott’s moods even more. When the boy was shutting himself in his room, unable to get up even to the toilet he could hear during almost every evening when Hugo was after work and he had a little bit of spare time, his father’s music, always the one that Eliott adored. Very often Hugo played the melodies from the Pixar movies, that was one of the reasons why Eliott loves them so much. They were bringing all the delightful memories that he had with his family. 

When Eliott was really small kiddo he liked to lie under the piano when his father was playing. It was so soothing and Eliott never felt happier than during those moments. After each Hugo’s session, he was trying to teach Eliott some basics things that every beginner has to know about piano and playing on it, at the beginning that little boy was only laughing when his efforts were pointless because each time he was pressing the wrong key, his father was tickling him and they never stood more than a ten minutes with proper studying, they were always ending on the floor, laughing about nothing and simply enjoying each others company. From time to time Eliott’s mom was joining them but her skin was like a rock and tickling her was pointless and her little son didn’t see a point in running after her as he was doing to his father. 

Eliott really missed those times. 

“Boo, are you coming?” He heard Emma’s voice behind him and he was glad that she didn’t come closer because otherwise he wouldn’t get the chance to wipe his lonely tear up. 

“Yeah, sure. Where are we going now?” 

Eliott realized that Yann was standing outside, talking with somebody on the phone, and Alexia was taking some orders, standing behind the counter with her mother. Eliott didn’t even hear when those customers came into the shop, he could swear that it was only four clients before he turned to the piano but now it was about ten people wandering around the shop. 

The boy smiled at Emma, seeing her concerned look but thankfully she said nothing. 

“Sorry but I have to go,” Yann spoke, right after when Emma and Eliott went out of the shop. “My mum stuck somewhere on the way to my uncle and her car broke down. I have to go to her.” 

“Is she okay?” Emma asked with a worried voice and her boyfriend sent her reassuring smile. 

“Yeah, she just doesn’t have any lift to home. I’ll be at yours later, okay?” He asked, touching his forehead with Emma’s one. Eliott found this kind of affection as awfully cute and he couldn’t contain his smile. His friend only nodded to her boyfriend’s words and she kissed him tenderly. 

“We’re gonna catch up with some dubstep session, I hope,” Yann said, changing his focus on Eliott. The boy smiled even wider and nodded in approval. “Emma will send me your number and we’re gonna meet soon, I’m sure of it.” He winked towards Eliott and right after that he caught a taxi and Eliott was only able to shout ‘see ya’ before the boy disappeared in the black car. 

“He’s pretty cool.” Eliott stated when Emma put her arm under Eliott’s one. 

“That’s his magic trick. Nobody can resist Yann.” She answered completely seriously but her face broke with laughter only a second after. Eliott accompanied her but his thoughts were still a bit foggy because of the all memories that were back to him after seeing the piano. 

“We can wait a bit for Alexia and grab some beer or something.” Emma proposed, turning to the entrance of the shop. 

Eliott nodded to this idea, he knew that being out with some friends and just put a pause to his thoughts for a moment would be a better idea than go back home and looking at the ceiling. Moreover, he had no will to paint anything, it was no use to go back to his apartment. So being out and about with girls was definitely in his Monday schedule.

****

Putting a pause to Eliott’s thoughts went pretty great, Emma was a little bit too drunk as for a Monday evening, Alexia was laughing like a little sweet pig and the boy had no idea what was so funny for her but he preferred not to ask. When he realized that Emma’s phone was calling and calling but she decided to play the Harry Potter game, which Eliott had to remember to make some fun of his friend because what the hell happened that she had a Harry Potter game on her phone, he knew that she was completely gone for the night. Eliott saw it was Yann who was trying to reach his girlfriend so he looked on Emma’s phone screen, retyped the number and called to his friend’s boyfriend. 

“Hey Yann, it’s Eliott, I’m with Emma and she’s a bit loaded, I can take her home but Alexia is with us too and I don’t wanna leave her alone because she’s also in a weird state.” The boy didn’t even realize that he was speaking way too fast and probably Yann didn’t get all words but luckily, as an answer Eliott heard Yann’s laugh. 

“Nice way to start a week, right? And you, are you okay?” Eliott was taken aback a little because of that question and instead of answering the boy only nodded his head but it was obvious that Yann couldn’t see that. 

“Erm, yeah I had only one beer, I’m not a huge fan of drinking at the beginning of the week.” He joked, but it was a lie. Because of the meds Eliott had, he quitted drinking almost completely. One beer from time to time was only when he was with Emma and he never felt as he needed more. 

“Send me your location and me and Lucas we’ll take care of the girls.” Eliott heard Yann’s answer and right after the boy hanged up. Before Eliott let himself focused on the boy that Emma’s boyfriend mentioned, he sent the location and put his phone into his jeans. 

Now he could think about Lucas and his weird behavior from today. Eliott had some mixed feelings about that man. The warm that he felt during the quick handshake was something absolutely surprising for Eliott and he felt some kind of affection towards that blue-eyed boy but right after when he spoke and how he did that, changed Eliott’s opinion. 

His thoughts were again stopped by clingy Alexia and it was good that she did that because he prevented Emma from slipping from the chair. Emma was already in the sleepy drunk state and Eliott was so glad that Yann would appear soon, and as if by the touch of a magic wand he spotted Yann and Lucas coming to the bar. 

Immediately Yann took care of Emma and she was completely out of the ability to properly talk so she just open and closed her eyes and went out along with Yann, after he thanked Eliott for keeping the companion to the girls. 

“Come on, Lexi. We’re going home.” That was Lucas who appeared on the right side of the other girl and she literally jumped from the chair and with a huge grin on her face, she took Lucas’s hand and to Eliott’s surprise, she also took his hand. 

“We’re gonna be such good friends, guyss.” She screamed right after when they left the bar. 

“Alexia, I should go home.” Eliott said, after a minute of awkward silence which obviously the girl didn’t notice. 

“Nope, you’re staying with me and Lulu. We’re gonna be friends.” And she started humming some unknown melody under her nose. 

For the whole way to the girl’s home nobody said anything more but they stayed in the same position as at the beginning. Alexia’s mind was definitely in different places so she didn’t care about a weird tension between guys. 

Finally, when Alexia was trying to find her keys, which was taking her a while, Lucas took a deep breath and turned face to face to Eliott. 

“Eliott, I want to say sorry. For my earlier behavior.” Eliott immediately smiled because he felt that this blue-eyed boy was a good person so he wanted to forget about that first not so nice meeting. “Yann said that I wasn’t very kind and I suppose to apologized so yeah, I’m sorry.” 

Eliott smirked, as Lucas before in the cafe and shook his head. So he was wrong, Lucas was, as a matter of fact, an asshole. 

“Oh, Yann said it. I’m so glad that Yann is the one who can think for you. Wow, I’m deeply moved by your apology, Lucas. You’re such a thoughtful person.” Eliott couldn’t contain his sarcasm. It was obvious that Yann was the one who clearly ordered Lucas to be sorry for his behavior. Lucas was definitely okay with it. 

The blue-eyed boy was a bit taken aback by Eliott’s reaction but the latter had no intention in being sorry for his tone. Lucas deserved the same treatment as he gave to Eliott. 

“Eliott, listen, don’t make a big of a deal of it, okay?” Lucas started with such a casual tone that it pissed Eliott even more. He smirked again and put his fists into his pocket to prevent himself from showing how salty he was. 

“Yeah, sure. You can tell Yann that you did your task, maybe he’ll give you a pin of a brave patient or maybe he will put a sunny sticker on your board for good behavior. But little advice for the asshole’s future, if you’re not sorry just don’t lie. Stay with being an asshole.” 

After that he waved toward Alexia, who was totally stunned by the boys’ conversation and probably it made her sober again. 

The whole walk to his home passed so fast that Eliott didn’t even realize when he was standing in front of his tenement with the key to his apartment in the right hand. 

The first thing after closing the door Eliott did was putting out the sheet of paper and the last letter from P but when he took the pen in his hands he was unable to write anything. He was still so annoyed by Lucas and he didn’t want to write to P in such a state. Writing those letters was something soothing for Eliott, almost as soothing as listening to his father playing piano and he didn’t want to disturb it by some douche named Lucas. 

He took off his clothes and without taking even a short shower, he lay down on his bed, still, a bit angry but the thought of P calmed him a bit and with the thought that the first thing after getting up would be writing to his letter friend, Eliott fell asleep with a shy smile on his face. 


	5. Quatre

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for a small delay, you know, Holidays and stuff.  
> Btw, Happy Easter if you're celebrating ^^  
> I hope you all are okay sweethearts ^^

__

_Dear Peter,_

_First thing first, I know who or what Joker is, maybe I’m not a fan of some weird-ass guy wearing clown makeup but I saw all the hype about that thing, so no worries about it, and please, ‘the Chosen One’ riddle? (yes, I wrote in on purpose, I can be a joker to ;) ) You’re talking to the biggest Harry Potter fan so step aside, my dear Peter. You have no chances with me when it comes to HP, books or movies, whatever you choose._

_The second important thing, don’t be sorry for your ‘mumbling’, ever. I think it’s totally adorable that you wanted to write to me even though you were completely hangover. It’s cute. You’re cute. And thank you, I think you’re also a good person._

_And because you are so cute you don’t have to worry (as if you were, probably not because why you should be worried about anything connected with me?), you’re the only person that I’m writing letters. The only one ever. You are right (again! What a newie for you, right?) that I have a way too much trust in people but it’s the way I am. I prefer to see the bright side of our horrible horrible world. Maybe I’ll give you a bit of my positiveness and you won’t be so grumpy._

_Peter, it’s so incredibly exciting that you were able to describe perfectly what I’m experiencing. The way you depicted the emptiness is exactly how I am feeling very often, almost all the time even. I’m glad to have you and don’t be alone in this world anymore. I mean, it’s impossible to ‘have’ anyone but you know what I mean, right? It’s about mutual feeling, about that small thought that somewhere, among other anonymous people, you are not alone with some stuff that is happening in your head. As simple as that, you really made me feel less alone. Thank you._

_I hope you survived your hangover and had a proper amount of sleep. Being sleep deprived is an awful thing, trust me._

_By the way, I’m sorry for not answering you faster. I wanted to, for real. I couldn’t stop thinking about things that I want to put in this letter from the moment I read your last message but I was so caught up with some friends and (unfortunately) asshole things that I just wasn’t able to focus on writing. I’m so sorry P._

_I hope you are okay and you won’t punish me for such a late answer and I won’t have to wait for your letter. I’m already counting minutes._

_Love,_

_Verginius_

_Ps. Please, say that you’re also a fan of other movies than marvel and anti-/heros ones because otherwise, I’m lost. I’m always falling asleep during watching stuff like this or my eyeballs are becoming tired after repeatedly rolling my eyes._

_Pps. Yes, I know HP is a kinda hero movie too but that’s the only exception so don’t judge me._

Eliott felt that grinning after writing each letter to P was going to be his habit. Just staring at his piece of paper and the one from his new friend and smiling as he was doing this for the first time. It was so thrilling. 

As normal for this kind of moment, it was disturbed by Eliott’s phone, and exactly by the message from Sofiane if Eliott could stay in work for a little bit longer because Sofiane would be late. The boy answered right away that it wasn’t a problem and after lurking at the hour, he decided that it was time for preparing his ass to work. 

His main aim for today was to talk with one of his bosses about changing his work hours. Next week Eliott would start university and working during a week wouldn’t be a choice for him. He was so glad to get this job and he didn’t want to lose it, and he even had that little thought that maybe because Emma’s mother was an owner of the gallery, she wouldn’t let Eliott be fired so easily. But he knew that first things first, he should do his job the best as he could and try to talk it out with Leon or Penelope before turning for his lifeline, Philippine. 

After taking a quick cold shower and grabbing only a bite of the sandwich, he went out from his apartment earlier than normal because he had a more important task to do which was leaving the letter in P’s box and after taking the envelope into his hands he couldn’t stop smiling. Again. Maybe he would gonna regret not having a proper morning meal but eating didn’t matter when he had such important tasks do handle. 

When Eliott went out from his building and took a deep breath of the morning air he couldn’t believe that he was so lucky to live in Paris, one of the best cities on Earth in Eliott’s opinion. And what’s more, autumn has just started and this time of the year couldn’t be better. The end of September in Paris was absolutely magical. All the warm colors of orange and red were already visible, balanced perfectly with still greenish leaves that were left on branches and Eliott couldn’t stop himself from admiring that beauty of nature. He was standing near to the huge maple and he closed his eyes, feeling the warm sunrises breaking through the leaves. It was a truly wonderful feeling to forget about surrounding noises and crowds, be completely zoned out at least for a moment among those people who completely ignore such small everyday miracles. Sometimes Eliott wanted to make other people start admiring it as much as he did but he knew that it was a waste of time to change people’s minds about such stuff. Maybe that was only his thing, to see all the things that others just didn’t care or they simply didn’t want to see that beauty. 

He was glad that at least he could marvel over it. 

Eliott finally opened his eyes, took a deep breath and with a gentle smile he headed to Peter’s house. He waited a minute or two before he could catch the door after an older woman that was going out from the tenement. She smiled at him warmly and he answered with the same. Such small kind gesture as showing a smile to a stranger and day was better already. 

The boy took out the letter from his inner pocket and with a wide grin he put it in the letterbox number 7. He had a look on the stairs because for a short moment he felt a strong urge to go upstairs and at least checked how the doors with number 7 looked like. But he knew that it wouldn’t be enough for him. He would have wanted more and he couldn’t let himself do so. The letter relation had to stay only in letters, nothing more or less, as he hoped. 

When he was almost at his job he realized that he still had almost half an hour and on second thought Eliott decided that he could do more in this amount of time than just being earlier in work so he headed to Yann’s job. When he saw the big sparkly sign he realized that he didn’t even know if Yann worked today or not but he took his chances and went to the shop. 

Right at the moment when he stepped inside he recognized the song that was played in the speakers. Bass Head by Bassnectar. So it was Yann’s shift for sure. Eliott didn’t have to wait long before Emma’s boyfriend noticed him. He greeted him with a warm hug and smiled. 

“So what are you doing after work?” Eliott asked without further thinking and pretty quickly he realized that he should’ve started with some small talk. Fortunately Yann only chuckled a bit and nodded. 

“Are you reading in minds or something?” Eliott looked with confusion on the boy, clearly not getting the point but after Yann showed him his phone, he got it. Yann was just in the middle of the texting to Eliott to meet after work so Eliott’s question was right on point. 

“Arthur and Lucas are coming to mine and I thought that when you will appear, we will finally listen to some good nice music.” And Yann pointed at his laptop, where Eliott could see the Spotify tracklist with all the EDM music. He really had a nice taste. “Arthur is always complaining about it and well, Lucas is not so much a complainer but he likes to make fun of me because of it and now, when Emma is also against me, he found a good friend in her. They got along pretty good and definitely an instant.” The boy was smiling all along during his talk but when Eliott heard the information about Emma’s getting along with Lucas, he felt something weird in his stomach and he lost his grin from his face. And he definitely was smiling just a few minutes ago, wandering around the city. 

“So, at six at mine, I’ll send you the address.” Eliott wasn’t sure if Yann said something more before it but gladly he remembered that he had to stay at work a little bit longer so the meeting with ‘The Getting Along Lucas’ would happen at least a little bit later. 

“I’ll text you about the hour, okay? I promised my friend that I’ll stay at work a little longer and I don’t know when he will be back.” Eliott tried to smile because he knew that he shouldn’t be mad at Yann for being happy that his very best friend was fucking getting along with his new girlfriend. 

The thing that was bothering Eliott was that Emma said nothing about Lucas. Okay, maybe she mentioned him like once and she said that she would talk about him a bit more but she hadn’t brought the topic any time later. 

“Eliott?” The boy heard his name and he could see the worry on Yann’s face. He had to put on a front that everything was alright.

“Uh, sorry. I still haven’t got my coffee and I think I could be still sleepy.” Eliott smiled but he saw on Yann’s face that the boy wasn’t fully convinced, however, as Eliott, Yann pretended that he noticed nothing and he just nodded his head.

Eliott wanted to say something, to joke about his weird behaviour but he was kinda woozy and he preferred to not lie to Yann so his mouth remained closed. Fortunately some clients went into the shop and Yann had to take care of them. 

“I’ll write to you later.” Eliott said right before he opened the door and after the last view on Yann’s warm smile, he headed to his job. 

****

During his lunch break Eliott with a huge cup of coffee in his right hand was wandering around the store looking at the sculptures and paintings that weren’t still sold or sent to the new owners. He stuck near to the painting of the modern vision of the Greek god, he guessed it must have been Apollo and when he looked closely on the face of the man, he realized that it was very similar to Lucas’s face but the eyes were different. He cursed at himself inside his head because of how the hell he had started seeing Lucas’s face so often when he should completely ignore that little nasty person. However, he shifted back his focus to the paint and he studies it, still seeing Lucas’s face in his mind. The ‘Apollo’ that was so similar to Yann’s friend had brown eyes and Eliott must admit that Lucas’s oceans’ eyes were definitely more beautiful, more mesmerizing. But immediately range has arisen in him, remembering about that little, with the highlight on _little_ asshole. How he could think about Lucas so rudely and gently at the same time. Eliott could tell that his thoughts were probably a little childish. In fact, he knew almost nothing about Lucas so maybe indeed, he shouldn’t have called him an asshole right on their second meeting but, on the other hand that boy almost asked for being called by names. He behaved like a jerk so why Eliott should have stopped himself from saying it aloud. Emma popped out in Eliott’s mind and he was sure his friend had a slightly different opinion about Lucas and it was making Eliott feel, _weird_ as of the lack of the vocabulary for the feeling that Eliott experienced when he heard what Yann said about Emma’s and Lucas’s relation. 

He wasn’t like _jealous_ jealous. Eliott would be just glad if his best friend would have told him about such an important and close person in her life. He would have deeply appreciated that. Very damn much. 

“Eliott?” The boy heard his name and turned around to Penelopy who was standing near to the door of the store. “Leon said that you want to talk with me.” 

“Erm, yeah, I want. It’s kinda important.” He answered, approaching the woman. She always looked so angry or at least annoyed. She was definitely a beautiful woman, nobody could deny it. She was in her thirties, maybe close to forties. She was almost as tall as Eliott but she was always wearing very tall high heels which made Eliott smaller and it gave Penelope an even more powerful look. She had long dark brown curls and it looked perfectly along with her dark skin. Sometimes in a full light Eliott could swear that her eyes were totally black but it wasn’t scary, rather ravishing. Every person that Penelope looked at felt smaller, she had just that type of aura that you knew that she was the boss, no matter where she was and with whom. 

“Next week I’m starting the last year on uni and I wanted to know if it is possible to keep the job but just in a different schedule. I probably won’t be able to work during the week, or at least not from Monday to Thursday. I’ll take every Friday event if it’s gonna be needed to stay here.” Eliott tried to remain calm but he was speaking faster than normal. That also was his thing when he was stressed. Biting his lower lip and talking fast. 

“Oh.” The reaction of Penelope wasn’t the one that Eliott had expected. He thought rather hear ‘so you won’t work here from the next week’ or something like ‘okay, but every Friday even the whole weekends are yours’ not just simple ‘oh’. The short time of silence arose between Eliott and his boss and he wasn’t sure what to do. “Oh, sorry Eliott.” Penelope finally said and she even smiled a little. “I’m just a bit confused that you’re asking for it with such fear in your voice. But don’t worry, really. I’ll keep you here until you’ll decide to run away from that job. People here love you and many of our clients are impressed by you, you are the real master of the small talk with that rich asses, believe me. I’m in this for too long, I can tell. And by the way, I hope someday I’ll lead your display here. So don’t worry about keeping the job, next week you will tell me your school timetable and we will figure something out.” 

Eliott was absolutely slack-jawed. He had never heard such words from Penelope, of course after each exhibition she was saying something like a good job, or nice work but Eliott thought that it was just something taught by Penelope to show that she also has some emotions. He would have never expected to hear such compliments from her. And what’s more, he still had the job. 

“Emm, Penelope, “ The boy has started but she raised the file that she was keeping in her hands. 

“Say nothing and go back to work. I want to see those files fill until the end of the day. When Sofiane appears, give him the rest.” Eliott took the documents from her, still a bit too stunned to say anything. When he looked down at the papers so see what’s his afternoon would be about he heard Penelope’s voice again. 

“Eliott, “ He raised his head, with no idea what to read from his boss’s face. “You’re welcome.” And she winked at him before she disappeared behind the doors of her office. 

****

Not so surprisingly Sofiane hadn’t shown up at work. He called Eliott and he even wanted to come but he would’ve appeared only for an hour and a half so Eliott decided to be the good friend and took the whole shift for Sofiane. He knew, in that case, he wouldn’t go to Yann before seven-thirty and he was a bit anxious that Emma’s boyfriend wanted to meet with him, and fortunately/unfortunately with his friends and he would be so late. Of course Eliott talked with Yann and explained everything and Yann swore that it was okay because the next day he had a day off so it wasn’t a problem. However, it was still an issue for Eliott or maybe his mind was making things up just to make him more anxious. That was also a possibility. 

At seven forty-one Eliott was walking into the street where Yann had his apartment, keeping in his hand a bag of beers, just to make a better impression and not be just a late guest with nothing to give. He looked at his phone to checked the number of the flat and his heart almost jumped to his throat when he heard aloud ‘Hi’ in front of him. 

It was Lucas, keeping the doors open and it seemed as if he also just appeared near to the building. His face was a mixture of confusion and maybe a bit of shame but Eliott couldn’t be sure. One thing that he was sure, it was the fact Lucas’s bags under his eyes weren’t so visible as last time. He still looked tired but not as awful as last time when Eliott saw him. 

“Hi.” Eliott answered, standing near to the doors and because Lucas was already standing on the hall floor it looked as if he was taller than Eliott and the boy smiled just for a second remembering how he thought about Lucas as the ‘little asshole’. “We should go inside.” He added, completely ignoring Lucas’s attempt to speak up. Eliott had no strength for the next fake apology. “I don’t want to be late more than I’m already.” The boy added because he couldn’t help himself to say that comment aloud. He was turned back to Lucas, already walking on the stairs so he couldn’t see the smaller boy’s face but he could hear aloud gasp. He knocked at the door at the same time when Lucas rang the bell and he could swear the Lucas smiled at him a bit but Eliott couldn’t tell if it was the kind type of smile or the asshole one, the same as from the morning at the cafe. 

“Finally!” Yann literally screamed at the boys, greeting them with a beer in his hand. He hugged Eliott and Lucas when they entered the flat and behind Yann’s back some other guy has appeared. 

“Hello, I’m Arthur.” He offered his hand to Eliott and smiled at him brightly. Eliott noticed right away that he had this warm type of smile, the one that made you liked that person on the instant. 

“Eliott” 

“I see you have some presents for us.” Yann joked and without further question he took the bag from Elliot’s hand. “Wooo, you really felt bad for being late, aren’t you?” He kept speaking while taking out all the beers that Eliott bought. He just laughed slightly, helping with putting all the stuff inside the fridge. “See Lucas, that’s what you should do when you’re late every time.” Yann turned to Lucas who was standing near to the kitchen entrance, leaning on the doorway. The boy was probably lost in his mind and he took him a few seconds until he showed a middle finger and went to the other room where probably Arthur was playing FIFA, recognized by the sounds of the speaker and that few curses that Arthur screamed to no one. 

“Are you drinking tonight or pass?” Yann asked, keeping the four beers on the kitchen table. It was nice of him that he remembered what Eliott told about his drinking habit or rather lack of it. That boy always appreciated such little things that others remembered about him, it showed that they care. 

“All is yours.” Eliott answered, taking the pack of Fromage crisps which was laying on the table. Yann laughed and after putting the one beer into the fridge, he took the rest and nodded to Eliott to follow him. 

Yann’s apartment was definitely bigger than Eliott’s one. The kitchen was on the right on the hall, the style rather old fashioned, as it stuck in the eighties or maybe early nineties. Everything was simple and a bit messy but in a pretty organized mess, as if Yann probably knew where he would have searched for anything. The living room was connected with hall and there Eliott could finally notice more of Yann’s personality. The electric and classic guitars were placed in the right corner of the room, shelves with games and CDs above it. Near to the wall the caramel sofa was standing, occupied by Arthur and Lucas that was focus on the TV and they were cursing on each other for unfair playing. On the left Eliott noticed a pair of doors and by guess he could know that one of them was leading to the bathroom and the other to Yann’s bedroom. 

Overall it was the cozy apartment that suited Yann pretty well. The boy figured that Eliott was looking around the place and after heading the pack of cigarettes to him, he explained how he got it. 

“After my grandma died, we didn’t want to leave my grandpa here alone so now he lives with my parents and sister and I got the apartment. I have to do some renovation here, repaint the walls or something but I think I’m too lazy for this right now.”

“Or you just have no money, my dear friend.” Artur slipped, taking the package from Eliott.   
“Yup, that also can be true.” 

“So Eliott, my new best friend, what are you doing for a living? Yann said that you are the artsy guy, but he didn’t explain in what way artsy.” The blond guy continued, heading the pad to Yann and both guys switched places. Yann and Lucas were playing FIFA on the sofa and Arthur sat on the pillows, near to the armchair that Eliott took the seat. 

“I’m studying fine arts and I’m working at the art gallery.” The boy explained after putting the cigarette to the jar with water. He had the same thing in his apartment, he was never a fan of ashtrays because unluckily he was always making a fuss with it and the jar was the only good answer for him and for keeping the flat clean from ash. 

“Mmm, the artsy guy in it finest. You are more into some new stuff or rather keep it classic, with canvas and easels?” Arthur was carrying on with questions, completely focused on Eliott. He glanced at the boys on the sofa but nor Yann or of course, Lucas were looking at him. They were completely occupied by the 22 guys running on the screen. Eliott switched his focus back on Arthur. 

“Definitely canvas, I’m an old fashioned man. I’m trying new styles from time to time but working on canvas is something incomparable to any other type of art, at least for me. I’m not saying it’s better, I’ll never be such judgmental. It’s just my preference. When I have the blank canvas and I have only paint around me, nothing else matters for me. And even after finishing something that I’m not so proud of, the view of full... Erm, everything is okay?” Eliott had to stop himself because he wasn’t sure if he should’ve been worried about Arthur’s facial expression or rather glad that he was seeing sparkles and a huge grin on his face. 

“Oh, yeah. Sure. Your face when you were talking about your art, it’s just…” He shook his head slightly, still smiling. “It’s so shitty that I forgot my camera, I would make such a magnificent photo of you right now, at this moment.” 

Eliott felt the warmth on his cheeks and he was sure that he was smiling like five-year kiddo when his favorite teacher is praising his work. Silly reaction.   
“Your expression is very similar to Lucas’s one when he’s playing the piano.” Eliott looked at the blue-eyed boy at the exact moment. Even though the prior still claimed Lucas as the asshole person, he already adored looking into his eyes. Their color couldn’t be compared to anything Eliott had ever seen in this world. They were more mesmerizing than the clearest, the bluest sky on a sunny day; any type of river, sea or ocean couldn’t be presented on the same level of the divine color of Lucas’s eyes. They were just perfect. 

But it changed nothing when the owner was a douche.

“You play the piano?” Eliott asked before he could bite his tongue. He should be as cold towards Lucas as the boy was to him. He completely didn’t care if ‘the perfect eyes’ guy played the piano or not. It was definitely information that Eliott could live without. 

“I played the piano.” Surprisingly Lucas answered but he stressed, a bit too angrily in Eliott’s opinion, the word ‘played’ as to remind everyone in the room that he stopped it and he wouldn’t do it any time soon. He still was keeping his eyes on Eliott, none of them wanted to be first to break the contact. Eliott couldn’t decide if the feeling that had appeared inside him was the pleasant or the opposite one. All he knew that looking straight into Lucas’’s eyes made him feel a bit bizarre and he hated the thought that he was so lost with naming his own emotions. 

“Something happened?” Eliott asked another question, still looking directly into those stunning eyes and he regretted speaking aloud that question right away when the words flew through his mouth. Lucas jaw clenched, his eyes became darker and he strengthened the grip on the pad. Eliott definitely shouldn’t have said that. Abso fucking lutely. 

“I’m not gonna talk about my personal life with some random that I won’t even remember the name soon.” The answer was cold and very firm that nobody couldn’t even pretend that Lucas made only a slip of the tongue.

That sentence completely shocked, not only Eliott but also Arthur and Yann, but at that moment Eliott didn’t care about others’ reactions. He had no idea what exactly he did that Lucas gave him such treatment. Okay, maybe he wasn’t as polite as he normally was for everyone else but after all it was Lucas that has started that gratuitous quarrel between them. Eliott just played along. The boy couldn't look straight into Lucas’s eyes anymore but he had to at least glance at him and he noticed that the other guy also wasn’t able to keep his look on Eliott. For a few moments a heavy silence had appeared in Yann’s apartment and nobody knew what to do. 

Eventually, Eliott stood up and after the last glance at Lucas he took a deep breath and headed to the exit. 

However, just before he got to the doors, he turned to Lucas and with voice completely devoided of emotions, he spoke only the one sentence. 

"When you will finally outgrow from your douchebag side call me to apologize but you know, next time do it sincerely." Eliott remained strong and his sight didn’t even slip to Lucas’s body. 

“I’ll better be going. Thank you for the invitation Yann.” The boy said when Emma’s boyfriend and Arthur also stood up and they walked him to the door. 

“Eliott, you don’t have to go. I’m so sorry for..” Yann has started but the taller boy stopped him by putting a palm on Yann’s arm. 

“I think I have to. And don’t be. It’s not your thing to say.” Eliott smirked under his nose remembering Lucas’s attempt to apologize but after all it turned out it was only Yann’s idea. This boy was definitely too good and Eliott couldn’t believe that such a person as Lucas was a best friend of Yann. Truly surprising. 

“I’m gonna pop into your art gallery, you’re gonna show me the place of your future display.” Arthur said with such a pleasant tone as the atmosphere was still the same as five minutes ago.

“You haven’t seen my work yet. What if I am a terrible painter?” Eliott tried to sound playfully but he knew that his attempt was awfully weak. “I have the feeling that you’re pretty awesome.” Arthur answered with a wink and he hugged Eliott when the boy opened the door. 

“Again, thank you Yann. See you soon.” And after the last hug from Yann, Eliott walked down the stairs. 

When the boy opened the door and he was finally outside, standing among other pedestrians he realized that his breath was a bit faster than normal. 

Eliott hated situations like that. He had that inner need to be liked to by everyone or at least be tolerated by every person he met in his life. He was trying to be kind to each soul he knew because who he was to behave like a jerk just without a reason, he never knew what the other person was struggling with so he wasn’t judging anyone, or at least he tried to.

But this “Lucas’s” case, that was different. Eliott had no idea what happened that Lucas behaved towards him with such an attitude. From the very first moment that boy was abrupt and cold. 

And the most annoying part of that ridiculous situation was the thing that each time when Eliott was thinking about Lucas, he always saw that damn incredible eyes in his mind and that pissed him off so much because only the one quick view of that color and Eliott’s anger was smaller than it should be. 

The man glanced at the door of the tenant and for one short moment he wanted to go back upstairs and shouted at Lucas for being such a dick. 

Or maybe Eliott was just exaggerating everything? What if all that happened was only just a small misunderstanding and Eliott was just a full who couldn’t keep up with social interactions with new people. 

The boy couldn’t decide what he was feeling, all the emotions were culminating in that exact moment and he needed some kind of escape so he has started walking fast, just forward and forward, to calm himself and keep the focus on his breathing, not on the thoughts. 

Eliott knew that this situation wasn’t _bad_. He was fine, really. He just needed to calm himself a bit. So he walked and walked, and his legs were tired already and he couldn’t catch his breath anymore but he hadn’t stopped until he realized that he was standing just before the gate of his refuge. 

And that was enough to calm himself. 

Zero thoughts about Lucas, zero thoughts about fear of starting to panic. 

Just the sound of rustling leaves and flying birds. It was so calm, so soothing. And at that moment everything was right in place. That was Eliott’s point zero. In this place the real world didn’t exist. It was only Eliott and the surrounding sounds of nature.

And everything was just fine. 

Eliott had no idea how long he was wandering around the trees, looking at the stars that were hidden between the branches. He could stay there forever, without anyone around him but sadly the universe had slightly different plans for him. Eliott’s phone rang and he saw Emma’s face on the screen. 

“Hi, Boo, what’s up?” She was trying to sound casual but Eliott sensed after just that one sentence that she was worried about him. And that wasn’t fine because she shouldn’t have to have any reason for that. The only answer to her behavior was that somebody, and by somebody, Eliott meant Yann, called to Emma to inform her about today’s situation. And Eliott couldn’t understand it because why, on earth, Yann would have called Emma. He just left the apartment, trying to ignore The Asshole aka Lucas.

But Eliott didn’t want to make a big of a deal from Yann’s and Emma’s overprotectiveness. He wasn’t afraid that Emma told Yann about Eliott’s mental illness, she would never do such thing, so it must have been just Yann thing, that he was so protective towards his friends, even such new as Eliott was. 

“Nothing much, just walking around the city, as normal.” Eliott answered completely calm. He wasn’t pretending or trying to hide anything from Emma however he sensed that even Emma’s breathing was still full of worry. 

“You know, maybe when walking around will become boring you can drop by mine and we’re gonna have harry potter night or something.” 

“You, Emma Borges are proposing Harry Potter night? Am I hearing it right?” Eliott couldn’t hold his short laugh because he knew that she proposed it not only for Eliott’s sake but mainly for hers. He knew that the girl fell in love with that movie series but even after such a long time of their friendship, she didn’t want to admit it. 

“Yes, me. I want to make something nice for my friend.” She answered, trying to sound casual but Eliott could read her intentions even through the phone. 

“Okay, if you really wanna be so kind and suffer about twenty hours with harry potter just for me, I’ll be at yours in twenty minutes.” 

“Great, but I won’t let you in without cookie dough ice creams.” The girl said quickly and she hanged up. 

As Eliott said, twenty-two minutes later he was standing in Emma’s kitchen with two cups of cookie dough ice creams while Emma was preparing her bed for the harry potter marathon. 

“Sooo, are you gonna tell me what happened that you thought about the idea of spending this night watching such horrible and exhausting movie series, just for me? Because I hope you know that I know it’s not something you would do so willingly without any cause.” Eliott asked when he handed the ice cream to Emma. By her facial expression, he noticed right away that she was hiding something from him and even though the boy guessed what it was all about, he didn’t want to make it easier to Emma. He could have predicted it completely wrong so it was better to wait for a girl’s explanation. 

“Well, okay. Maybe someone told me that you would need a friend tonight and maybe that person asked me to check on you because they were worried a bit about you.” The girl answered, completely ignoring Eliott’s eyes. She curled up herself under the blanket, trying not to spill one her favorite desserts on her bed. Eliott did the same near to the girl and after putting a quick kiss on her head, he whispered. 

“Say thanks to Yann. I appreciate it even though all the worry wasn’t needed.” 

For a short moment Emma glanced at Eliott with a confused look but she smiled and nodded her head. 

“Yeah, Yann. I’ll thank him, sure.” 

Through the whole first part of the harry potter series both Eliott and Emma stayed silent, right after the end credits the girl took the empty bowl from Eliott’s hands and put the laptop a bit further away from them. 

“So, now you tell me what happened between you and Lucas.” 

The sentence was so unexpected that Eliott needed a minute to connect the dots with all Lucas’ case. 

“Erm, nothing happened. He is just a bit of a jerk towards me and I have no idea what his deal is.” The boy saw that his friend wanted to interrupt him so he added right away. “And no, I’m won’t ask him about it because he clearly is not comfortable with talking with me and I am okay with it. We do not need to be friends.” 

“Don’t you?” Emma asked, sitting crossed leg. “I mean, maybe you should be the one to reach to him and just talk.” Again that evening Eliott could sense that Emma’s words had the double meaning but in this case, the boy had no idea what was her point. 

“Ems, this guy has some issues and apparently I am one of them so no, I don’t think your idea is so great.” He reached to the laptop to play the second part but Emma took the computer from him. “Lucas is a really good guy, Eliott. If you just give him a chance and have at least a bit of willingness to get to know him better.” 

Even though Eliott wanted to prevent the rise of the feeling, jealousy appeared inside him and he just couldn’t hold a roll of his eyes. 

“Ems, I get that your relationship with Lucas is already so lovey-dovey but it won’t happen with me. So drop the subject. I tolerate this guy for yours and Yann’s sake but that’s it. I just don’t care, okay?” 

Eliott noticed that maybe he was just just a little bit too harsh but as it seemed, Emma seeing his reaction ended the discussion. The boy took the laptop and pressed play as fast as he could. For the rest of the night Emma hadn’t brought Lucas’s subject and Eliott appreciated it a lot but not talking about that boy didn’t stop Eliott’s mind from thinking about Lucas and his ethereal eyes. 

****

In the morning or rather an early afternoon, Eliott woke up hugging the empty bowl with the scraps of popcorn and he was nearly falling from Emma’s bed. The girl was still sleeping heavily and Eliott got up as quietly as he could, knowing that waking Emma up after almost sleepless night was one of the worst ideas ever. She was the grumpiest and the most whinging person in the whole world when she wouldn’t have enough hours of sleep. A literal nightmare for anyone who would wake her up. 

The whole marathon thing went pretty awesome after Lucas’s moment and Emma and Eliott watched the first four parts of the movies almost without any pause which caused falling asleep along when the sun was rising or maybe just a bit later. In the late morning slash early afternoon, even though Eliott didn’t have to be in a rush, after preparing a few sandwiches for his friend and the most gentle kiss on her temple that Eliott could make, he left the apartment. 

The first thing he realized after stepping into the doorsteps of his flat was the fact that he completely forgot about checking his letterbox and with only one shoe on his leg, he ran to the grand floor and seeing not one, but two envelopes with Peter’s handwriting, he completely zoned out. Eliott had no idea what Peter wrote but the fact that he got two letters made him so excited that he forgot how ridiculous he looked, standing in the middle of the hall, keeping two pieces of papers in his both hands, grinning like a mad man and having only one shoe on the right foot and showing to public his golden snitch sock on the left one. 

Every neighbor could have gone in front of Eliott and he wouldn’t have noticed it. 

At last, the coldness on his foot put his mind right on the track and the boy headed back to his apartment After throwing away his one shoe, he ran to his room and threw himself onto the bed. As gently as he could he opened both letters and checking that one of them was longer than the other, he had started with the longer one. 

_Dear Verginius,_

_Finally! I’ve started to think that you are weird weird and you do not watch any movies but thankfully, Potter saved you. I am not gonna start any Potterhead fights between us, I believe you and because of this maybe we can make a pact that I will teach you something about marvel and other hero movies and you will share some stuff from Potter. Of course I know a lot about it but if you are the master of Wizarding world I bet I can learn something from you. And, I hope, you will be open to getting some knowledge about hero movies. It’s just unacceptable that you’re against it! (Or if you’re really not into this just give me your mother’s phone number, I bet she would be my new marvel friend). ((And yes, of course, I like watching other movies too, for example, Pixar animated stuff are pretty good, I still have mine Nemo plushy somewhere in the wardrobe))_

_I like your confirmation that I am your only letter friend. You have no idea how smiley I am right now. It’s kinda disturbing, my roommate said that I look weird with such a smile and I blame only you. (This is my way of saying that you are also cute. Very very much cute). You are making my days simply better, I hope you know that. The last few months were a bit harsh for me. It’s not something I want to write about because I am still thorough in the healing process, as one of my new friends said, which sounds a bit funny but I think she’s right. You both, that new friend of mine and you, have appeared in my life at the right time, really. My ‘old’ friends are awesome, I love them deeply but something has changed since I have her, and it’s way much better with you. I’m such a sap, am I? You are already giving me enough of positiveness and for now it’s linked only with you and I’m okay with this. Baby steps, okay? (I am not grumpy! <insert a grumpy face>) _

_I wish I could help you with your sleeping schedule because believe me, I now being sleep deprived suck badly. And that hangover time was only a one-time thing. I’m not a drinking type and my not so huge body (I am not small, other people are just too big) is unable to absorb a lot of alcohol. I highly preferred other types of unhealthy ways to distract my mind (Rather illegal ones but shh, don’t tell anyone)_

_I hope your friends are okay and that asshole thing was handled properly and you don’t have to deal with that person anymore. You deserve to be surrounded by people at least as half as good as you. And remember, I will never punish you for anything and pausing our letter contact would be painful for me as (I assume?) it would be for you._

_Also counting minutes to your next letter._

_Kind Regards,_

_Peter_

Would Eliott ever get used to being so purely happy after reading Peter’s letter? Eliott highly doubted it and before he would be completely overwhelmed by writing his answer, he took the second, short letter and by reading just first sentence his could sense right away that something was wrong with Peter. 

_Dear V_

_It’s very late when I’m writing this note but I cannot sleep. My mind is running like crazy and it cannot stop even only a moment. It’s so infuriating._

_But I am not writing to you to complain and being a whiny person. I just wanna ask how you dealt with that asshole, the one that you’ve mentioned in your last letter. And, I know it’s highly improbable, but have you ever been a jerk towards anyone? I’m guessing you haven’t but can you imagine being one? (I know it’s stupid) Can you imagine what you could do and how to say sorry to the person that you were, let say, unpleasant._

_I’m sorry for being so chaotic. I really am. I just need someone else’s opinion._

_Your opinion._

_I am so sorry again._

~~_Love,_ ~~ _Kind regards,_

_P._

Words from the second letter were scrawled as if somebody were writing that note on a knee or somewhere leaning the piece of paper on the wall. Eliott was really worried about P and he had no idea what he could do to help his friend. Helplessness hit him hard and he didn’t even realize when he had started biting his lower lip. The only thing he could do was writing a letter to P and that was the thing he did right away. 


	6. Cinq

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry! (again :( ) I'm gonna blame my BA paper and generally, too much work from my Uni.  
> So sorry again, and enjoy the chapter ^^

_Dear Peter,_

_Your second letter made me realize how helpless I am when it comes to helping you. I really wish I could do something more but this letter is the only thing I can do right now. I hope, whatever happened, you are better now and you are not alone. I am always keeping you in my mind but I know in bad moments people sometimes need the presence of others. I wish it could be me but I have to work with what I have._

_The asshole case, let’s say that I am horrible with dealing with such things and my case is still open, unfortunately. That guy is making me feel weird stuff which I am not very fond of but I am pretty good with ignoring bad events of my life so I’m doing it right now. Ignoring the problem until it will be gone by itself. I know it’s a useless help, well as if you can say it is any type of help, rather not._

_And even if it’s highly flattering that you’re thinking of me so nicely, I must admit that I can be an ass, occasionally of course, but I am capable of saying unpleasant stuff, believe me. I’m trying to not being an asshole, even if somebody is the jerk towards me but I am only a human and I’m not perfect. When it comes to apologies I won’t be very helpful either. When I am mean to someone, the guilt is eating me up so I’m always trying to do the apologize right away and the easy and very obvious answer to do it properly is saying the truth, why I was the asshole to that person. Simple and very effective for me. Obviously if the truth is painful to talk about I would explain rather that to that person. I think talking about things openly makes you more vulnerable, but it also shows that you care and the other person would acknowledge it and would appreciate that deeply and probably even would forgive the asshole move. Believe me, honesty is freeing and even the worst truth is better than the best lie. I’ve learned that lesson a long time ago and I’m trying to live by it._

_Oh, wow, the beginning of that letter sounds….weirdly philosophical. I’m here to make you feel better and I hope that at least a little smile will appear on your face. That thought will brighten my day, very very much. So, to start our movie pact, I have one fun fact for you._ _Peeves, (I hope you know that he was the poltergeist in the books) was supposed to appear in the films but the director simply didn’t like how the character looked onscreen and cut him. Maybe it’s not so fun, rather sad and I must say that I would love to see Peeves on screen! And I feel bad for the actor who recorder some scenes and they just, cut them. Poor guy._

_I know that the Pixar thing was completely random but gosh, my heartbeat was weirdly fast for a short second because if you are not my lost soulmate I have no idea how to call it. Pixar’s animated movies are THE B E S T! Nemo is awesome and I bet that my Buzz and Woody toys would love to get to know your plushy. (Is it weird that I know that you won’t judge me, a guy in his twenties, for being so excited about such silly thing? It’s not, right?)_

_I can take all the blame for your smile. Your roommate can be mad only at me and I forbid that person for taking that smile away from you! (I hope it doesn’t sound like a threat or something, I am nice, I promise.)_

_You are cute my grumpy friend. C U T E. That’s all I’m gonna say for now._

_We would be awesome at parties cause because of my meds I’m not a huge fan of drinking too. And before you would ask that question in your next letter, the reason why is that - I’m bipolar. It’s not something I scream about to everyone but also it’s not something that I am ashamed of either and I wanted you to know that part of me. I don’t wanna compare your situation, whatever it is/was, but I know how to be in the lowest points of one's life so I’m always here (well, here as letters can be places) to listen to you or if you prefer, just mumble about some Potter stuff. I’m here for you P. Whenever you need it._

_I can wait to see your letter (I wish someday I will write ‘see you’)_

_Love,_

_Verginius_

After taking a quick shower and changing clothes, Eliott walked out of his apartment with the letter in his hand. When he was right in front of P’s door, he got a message from his mother ‘baked some muffins today’ with a photo of a huge plate of deliciously looking bakings, and he smiled because even though it wasn’t a very clear invitation, he knew exactly where he would be going later. 

When he was standing near to the letterbox number seven he couldn’t make himself to put the letter inside. He wanted to be sure that Peter was okay, that he was at least feeling better or to be sure that he wasn’t alone. Eliott would give everything to be with him right now but he knew he couldn’t go upstairs and check it. Even though Peter wouldn’t have any idea that Eliott was Verginius when he would have knocked to his doors, but of course Eliott would be aware of who he was. He couldn’t do this because he felt he could have lost Peter. And that was the last thing he would have wanted in his life. Or rather the thing that better would never happen, preferably. 

It was so weird but weird in a good meaning of that word that he felt such close connection to P. The letters were his safe places. He couldn’t let himself lose it. After last deep breath he put the letter into the box and with the quick glance on the staircase, he headed to his mother’s house. 

****

When Eliott got to the mahogany doors of his family house, Mike was the first who greeted him. Right away he jumped near to Eliott’s legs and had started walking between them just to get some cuddles so when Gabrielle opened the door, she saw her soon kneeling on the mat. 

“Hello son” She greeted him with a happy voice. Eliott stood up quickly and put a kiss on her cheek. They entered the house and after the last cuddle for Mike, Eliott headed to the kitchen to wash his hands and get to his mama’s best-baked goods. 

“Oh gosh, they are soooo good.” The boy mumbled with a mouth full of muffins. His mother was an awesome baker and Eliott sometimes encouraged her to open her bakery or patisserie but she was always answering that only good things that she could make, were the ones that she was making for Eliott and his friends. So baking for other people was not an option. 

“So what now, you’re gonna eat a whole plate and just leave me without any word?” Gabrielle joked, taking the muffins away from Eliott. The boy reached out to them with an aloud whine and he just followed his mother to the living room, not even answering to the question. 

Finally, when they settled on the couch, he took the plate from her and when Mike jumped on Gabrielle’s lap, Eliott took the remote control and chose the movie. 

“Iron Man?” Gabrielle almost shouted, seeing the thing that her son wanted to watch. 

“What?” The boy answered, not looking at his mom. He knew that one proper glance at his face and she would know that he had his reasons to choose such a movie. 

“Okay, for now I’m gonna enjoy that great movie and later you’ll tell me what’s going on.” She answered calmly and after changing her position into more comfortable, she focused on the tv screen. 

But Eliott couldn’t. 

All he could think about was P. If he already got his letter? Or maybe he was writing the answer, right at that moment? Or maybe P would never write back to Eliott because he would think that Eliott was mad for saying that P could be his soulmate? Eliott’s mind was running with such thoughts and he even forgot to eat his muffin. 

“Eliott, I don’t have to even ask to be sure that’s something isn’t right.” The boy heard his mom’s voice and he didn’t even realize that she stopped the movie. “Boo, I don’t wanna push you but we both know that you want to talk.” 

Eliott only nodded slightly, confirming Gabrielle’s words. She knew him way too well. 

“I have a new friend.” He stopped himself right before saying ‘friend that I have never met’. Even though Gabrielle would love the idea of the letter kind relation, this part Eliott wanted to save only to himself. That was their thing. Only his and Peter’s and what made it even more special. 

“A friend or a friend?” Gabrielle inquired with different voices on both ‘friend’ parts. Eliott chuckled because honestly, he had no idea. But the smile disappeared quicker than it appeared because when Eliott thought about the ‘friend’ that would imply the romantic relationship, for a split second Lucas had appeared in his mind and Eliott was so stunned by his mind that his thoughts stopped running. 

“Eliott?” Again, Gabrielle’s voice brought him back and he faked a smile, not to worry his mother more. 

“He’s a friend friend, just a friend. I don’t know him very long but I think I already know him well. It’s not the number of things we are talking about but rather the types of things we’re saying and how we’re doing this. It’s different than my other friends’ relations.” The woman nodded understandingly and after grabbing one muffin from the plate that was still in Eliott’s hand she answered. 

“I would like to meet him. I want to know the person that put my son in such a state.” 

Eliott laughed it off because it wasn’t like _that._ Peter was close to his heart and Eliott cared about him deeply but the things that his mother was implying, weren’t the things that felt towards Peter. It really wasn’t like that. 

“Okay, so for I’m seeing now, it’s obvious that I won’t meet that boy any time soon so at least tell me more about him. I know some bits about all of your friends so tell me his name at least.” Gabrielle wasn’t going to drop this subject and Eliott had to admit that he wanted to talk about Peter with somebody and he knew that the only safe person was his mom. 

“You said friends in the plural as if only I have more than one, Emma.” Eliott started and his mom only tousled his hair. “With Emma also Yann comes, and Sofiane, Imane, and Idriss. And Charles and Manon in the past, right?” Gabrielle answered but just with one look on her face she regretted mentioning the last two people. “Okay, so that new one. Tell me.” 

“His name is Peter and he also is a marvel freak.” Gabrielle smiled literally glowed hearing that sentence. 

“He is named as one of my favorite marvel characters and he is also a marvel geek! I adore this boy already!” Eliott couldn’t restrain himself and he burst into laugh seeing his mother’s reaction. “I bet he would like to meet you too because when he heard that I am not into marvel but I mentioned you are, he was very keen to switch my friendship for yours.” The boy joked, remembering how much he was smiling reading that part of Peter’s letter. He lost himself in the thoughts about this boy that he didn’t even realize how closely his mother was looking at him. If he looked at her, he would see her warm smile, her dark grey eyes with that sparkle which only mothers could have. He would have seen how happy she was for him because even though Eliott was a beamish person, and even his illness couldn’t take away that gleam from his heart or the things that happened last year, but she was aware that Eliott wasn’t like this, ever. Gabrielle always wanted the best for her son, after diagnose she was angry at herself for being unable to help him but at least she had her loved husband who was the most understanding, the kindest and the warmest person she ever knew. Hugo helped her to understand things that at first seemed too hard to comprehend. He was her light and everything was better just because he was with her. When she thought that she lost the most bright light in her life, Eliott reminded her that he was right there, beside her, and that would never change. And when she thought that she was the one who supposed to learn her son everything, Eliott was the one who helped both of them to start over. 

“Mom?” Eliott asked, whispering because when he finally went back to the reality he realized that Gabrielle was crying. His mother seemed to didn’t even realize that she had tears on her face. 

“Yes, Boo?” She answered, also whispering but she was smiling, completely ignoring the tears. 

“Why are you crying?” 

“I am not.” The woman answered, laughing a bit and Eliott couldn’t even decide if it was a sad or a happy laugh. Rather a mixture of both. 

“You thought about dad, right?” 

“I can hide nothing from you, right?” Gabrielle answered with the same tone as before and now Eliott was sure that Hugo was the one who had appeared in his mother’s mind. “You are great with hiding things from me, you know that.” 

“But sooner or later you always know.” The woman embraced Eliott with her left arm and the boy rested his head on his mother’s shoulder. “You are so much like him, Boo. You both are amazing with reading people, I can tell from experience.” 

“I am not half as good as Dad, in anything. I never saw him angry, at anyone, he was like some saint or something.” Eliott knew that talking about Hugo was still hard for both of them and sometimes when they needed such talk, it was better to do it casually, with a light tone and definitely without brining the memories from last year. 

“Oh Boo, you have no idea how angry your father could be. Sometimes he could be in a completely furious state.” Gabrielle said and Eliott was so shocked that he sat straight and looked with huge eyes on his mother. “You can’t be serious. Twenty years of my life I wasn’t a witness of such thing even once.” The woman was looking straight into Eliott’s eyes and he needs only a second to see that his mother was lying. 

“As I said, saint.” He commented, sitting back in Gabrielle’s arms. 

“Okay, maybe I exaggerated with the furious thing. But he could be mad, sometimes at some things.” Gabrielle added the last part with an unsure tone as even she didn’t believe in her own words. 

“Name one.” Eliott answered, looking up at his mother’s face. He saw how hard she was trying to remember about such a moment but when she smiled and shook his head a bit, he knew she could not do so. “How he was able to not be an asshole, even once. You knew him for what, a century? You should know some of his tricks.” Eliott carried on the subject, thinking about the situation with Lucas and he felt that his body tensed slightly. Even though he promised himself that he would never be the first to talk with Lucas, to clear their situation because Eliott didn’t care about that. At all, even an inch. But it didn’t cause any harm to ask his mother about how he could do so. It wasn’t like Eliott thought about that boy constantly. Only from time to time. Maybe once a day, or two. Or maybe once an hour but he did not care. Not in the least. 

“First of all, how old do you think I am and second of all, Hugo never thought about anyone as an asshole. Of course not every person he met was an angel as he was and I don’t know, maybe before we met he was different, I cannot be sure.“

“Yeah sure, so before you were like what, three?” Eliott interrupted because even though it wasn’t the main subject for him, he always loved to hear stories about his parents’ lives before Eliott was born. 

“Hey, we met when we were ten so your father could have met some unpleasant people through the first decade of his life and he could have behaved differently.” 

“I am not saying that he couldn’t, I’m just saying that it is just impossible. You know that. And after he moved to Paris you become inseparable and I must admit that I’m shocked that you were able to keep some friendships through your lives or even be able to focus on other people when all you could see was each other faces. Which on one hand is cute but on the other, some people probably were exhausted with your eternal love. So maybe that’s the answer for being a saint, just focus on one person through your whole life and voila, being a jerk becomes the unimaginable thing.”

“Oh wow, so mister talky is turned on today I see.” Gabrielle answered with a laugh for all Eliott’s speech. “We can keep the talk like that, no worries.” She added, before she had started tickling Eliott but he was fast enough to move away and take the plate with cupcakes. 

“Stop! Stop! You cannot touch me! I have cupcakes and I won’t hesitate to use them!” 

“And what are you planning to do, eat them all?” Gabrielle asked, still through laugh but she stopped moving her hands towards Eliott. 

“Okay, pause for now. I asked seriously. How dad behaved when people were jerks.” 

Gabrielle remained silent for a minute, looking in the distance. In Eliott’s mind Lucas appeared again and he also became serious at once. 

“You know, it’s impossible to live without being surrounded by people who cannot keep their mouth shut and they chew their ears off. And your father worked at school full of teenagers and some parents who thought that if they are paying for their children school, they can say and do anything to teachers. But Hugo always was patient and forgiving. For anything and anyone. Even when someone was talking shit to him, he remained silent, listening to every complaint and afterward, he wasn’t saying his complaints but he just asked that person what made them say some things. He was truly interested in what was happening in people’s lives, no matter who he was talking to. Sometimes it was so annoying because from time to time when we were arguing,” Eliott looked at his mother with confusion, because once again, he never saw his parents fighting.” Yes, Boo. I and Hugo knew each other for about thirty years so quarrels were inevitable sometimes. So when we were arguing, and after I poured out everything I was keeping inside me before, I was waiting for him to do the same but he just was silent for a moment or two, looking me straight into my eyes and just asking what happened that I said what I said and after that he was explaining very clearly why he did or said some things that led to our arguments. I think the reason why I can count our dispute just in both hands is the fact that your father was the most sincere and honest person I’ve ever met. And he never let anyone just move on before explaining everything between him and that person. He was pretty good with getting along with everyone.” She smiled slightly and continued.” Hugo always wanted to make other people’s lives better and take some pain from them. Sometimes he was too good at this.” Gabrielle added the last sentence quietly and Eliott hugged her immediately. Yes, his father was great at taking away the pain from others just to keep all of it to himself, trying to protect everyone but him. 

“But what happened that you asked about it?” The woman inquired, moving a bit away from Eliott and taking Mike on her laps. Petting that ball of fluff was always making everybody feels better. 

“Let’s say that I had a pleasure to meet some jerk recently and I wasn’t as thoughtful as dad and it seems that it bothers me more than I thought.” The boy didn’t want to dig deeper into the Lucas’ topic. It was more than enough to say about that situation and even admitting that he could not stop thinking about that boy was hard. 

“Just talk to him. Explain yourself and ask what happened that he behaved as he did.” Gabrielle answered, talking Mike in his hands and headed to the kitchen to give some food to the cat 

“Mom.” Eliott sighted, walking behind her, because how the hell he supposed to do such a thing. He really didn’t want to talk about Lucas. For real. He didn’t want to waste a nice time with his mom to talk about this ass. 

“I’m not gonna ask about anything, I answered your question what your father was doing with such situation, I told you my advice, now it’s your choice what you want to do with it.” 

At least Eliott was glad that Gabrielle didn’t push that topic any further. But it didn’t stop his thoughts about Lucas and even when he wanted to think about Peter again, only Lucas was appearing in his mind. And that was very annoying because his brain supposed to focus on pleasant stuff, not on the people that were riling Eliott up. 

****

On Thursday, when Eliott was heading to his work with a bag full of his mother’s cupcakes he didn’t expect what this day would bring. But before he would focus on current events, his mind flew to the Wednesday’s evening when after watching two of Iron Man’s parts, Eliott and his mom baked so many cupcakes that Gabrielle didn’t let her son leave the house until she packed for him about twenty heavenly good muffins saying that he should share such goods with his friends. 

When he finally arrived at his home, he checked his box, being one hundred percent sure that Peter already left a new letter for Eliott but the only thing he took away from there was a pizza restaurant flyer which he threw away right away. Eliott was so devastated with the lack of Peter’s letter that he wanted to eat all the cupcakes by himself but Sofiane’s call on WhatsApp saved Eliott from a certain stomach ache. The boy talked with his friend for more than an hour. It was always nice to chat with Sofiane just about nothing and everything. Imane’s boyfriend revealed his plans for their anniversary and asked Eliott if he could paint something for them. Of course Eliott was already on the board with a head full of ideas and he hushed Sofiane they the boy asked about the price. Getting money from friends for making a painting was a big no for Eliott. Maybe it wasn’t wise to create art and not taking payment for it but it was Sofiane and Imane. They knew each other forever and what’s more, the painting would be as a surprise from Eliott not only for Imane but also for her boyfriend. All the talk about their relationship led to talking about school times when they became that close group of friends. Now it was funny to think that when it was so obvious that Sofiane had a crush on Imane, he thought that Eliott supposed to have a crush on Emma and they would be going for a double date, letting Idriss be the third wheel. Fortunately between Emma and Eliott nothing intimate happened, ever. They treated each other as siblings so being a couple never even came to Eliott’s mind. For the boy Emma, Imane, Sofiane and Idriss were like family and their time in primary school was like constant fun and Eliott would never trade his memories from that time to anything. They were too precious. In the middle school Manon tagged along and it was so funny seeing how Idriss and Emma were silently fighting with each other because both of them had a crush on that new girl. Fortunately it didn’t destroy all group friendship and in the end, Emma and Manon became a cute couple, of course not as cute as Imane and Sofiane but it took ages until that boy asked her for a date. For some time everything was fine.

They stopped taking a walk down memory lane when the time with Eliott’s illness had started and Charles sallied out. Eliott and Sofiane were in a way too good moods to talk about that shithead or some unpleasant Eliott’s past actions. 

The boy completely forgot about the previous night when somebody stood just in front of him, just before the door’s to the gallery. And seeing who stopped Eliott from entering his work, the boy was to shock to even say a word. 

“Eliott, I am sorry. This time for real. Nobody said anything to me, I mean, not exactly but well,” Lucas hesitated a bit but seeing lack of reaction from the taller boy, he continued. “I was an asshole, a huge and complete jerk, I know this. For some time, I thought that I had the right to be an ass towards strangers, it’s not important why I thought so but now I know that I was just a stupid jerk and I am so sorry, Eliott.”

Lucas finally took a deep breath and Eliott could notice how red his cheeks were. He saw the difference in Lucas’s behavior, and he could also see that bags under his eyes had appeared again. But still, Eliott was unable to say a word. 

“Eliott?” Lucas asked, when the silence became too long. Eliott was looking in those ethereal blue eyes and right away all the anger was gone. He even forgot why Lucas was apologizing to him. Nothing had matter when Eliott could just explore every little change in Lucas’s eyes, how they looked in such lighting. It would be so fascinating to try to paint them. Eliott could search through all art stores just to find perfect paint, or at least the one that could capture at least the half of beauty of Lucas’s eyes. 

“I have no idea how to read people’s face Eliott, if you wanna punch me, do it but I beg you, do something.” Lucas’s voice was so desperate but the taller boy was like in some trance, he really couldn’t do anything. It frightened him. 

“I won’t punch you. I have work.” Eliott finally spoke but it was like somebody else made him articulate those words and the boy wasn’t still sure if he was awake or maybe he took to many meds today and they did something to him. But Lucas was still standing in front of him with hopelessness visible on his face. His eyes were sparkling but it wasn’t something enjoyable to Eliott, he didn’t want to look into these eyes anymore because he could notice pain in them and was afraid that he caused it. 

Within the last few seconds both boys moved a little bit closer to each other, completely unwilling and still without any clue that they did this but this fact let Eliott make a step and pass near to Lucas to enter the gallery. 

He didn’t turn around or even stop for a moment to say hi to his colleagues. He went straight to the storage when he could finally breathe and sit with silence. 

What the hell just happened? Eliott wanted Lucas to apologize to him and the boy did this so why Eliott behaved so ridiculous. What triggered in him such acting and what he supposed to do now? Eliott was clueless and he was afraid that if he went out from storage and he would see Lucas again, he would behave even worse and he couldn’t let anyone else to him in such state. At least Sofiane had the afternoon shift so Eliott was very glad about this at that moment. One less person to see him embarrassing himself without any proper reason. 

But Eliott had to work so after taking off his jacket and putting a box with cupcakes on the table he left his current safe space and headed to his desk. Fortunately, he didn’t see the blue-eyed boy so he finally started breathing calmly and settled down to do his work. 

The rest of the day passed without any worries and Eliott was doing everything just to stop thinking about Lucas. He helped with changing some sculptures, even though there were enough people to do so, he even helped Leon and had lunch with him when he had to hear something about Leon’s father’s cars that supposed to be his very soon. Eliott really did not care about any cars but Leon and his mumbling was an excellent distraction from any inappropriate thoughts. 

When Sofiane appeared in the gallery ten minutes before two in the afternoon, he saw right away that something was bothering Eliott but of course Eliott’s lips were sealed so Sofiane stopped putting any question. They knew each other enough that when one of them really needed to talk, they would eventually. 

At three-fifteen in the afternoon Eliott left his job, trying to focus on anything but Lucas. Unfortunately the universe had some other ideas to this boy and just after making three steps Lucas appeared in front of Eliott. Again. 

And Eliott’s mind went blank immediately. 

“Eliott, I won’t stop apologizing until at least you would understand. I won’t make you forgive me, I know it’s no use in that but at least we should try to behave like humans when we’re around each other. I know that part is mostly on me and I hope you didn’t take it as an insult or something. But you know, Yann is my best friend and Emma is yours and I suppose we’re gonna…” After all Lucas’s mumbling Eliott couldn’t do anything else but smiling slightly. Deep down he knew that he forgave Lucas at once when he saw that boy in front of his job this morning and seeing now how he cared, how he was truly felt sorry for his behavior Eliott could finally say that aloud. 

But even a little smile on Eliott’s face was enough to stop Lucas from the rest of his talk and after a deep breath he also shown his shy smile. 

“For Yann and Emma we can behave like humans I think.” Eliott didn’t have look closely at Lucas to see how much tension left the smaller boy body. 

“My name is Lucas Lallemant and most of the time, I’m not an asshole, I promise.” He offered his hand to Eliott. The boy shook it and laughed a bit. 

“Nice to meet you ‘not an asshole’, I’m Eliott Demaury and most of the time, I’m trying to be a good person.” 

They’d started to looking at each other almost as tense as in the morning but this time, they were happy doing this. Something definitely changed in both of them. 

“Should I assume that you were waiting here for the whole day?” Eliott asked when they had started walking, without any purpose. 

“Yes?” Lucas answered questioningly and Eliott saw how unsure of his reaction the other boy was. Eliott couldn’t deny that was something precious in Lucas’s behavior. 

“I suppose you’re hungry. I still have some cupcakes that my mom made yesterday, I wanted to keep them for my evening with ‘Cars’ marathon but I can do something nice for not an asshole.” Eliott smiled brightly glancing at Lucas and taking the box with a few muffins that weren’t eaten by his co-workers. 

They were walking around, eating cupcakes, looking at each other without any word and even if Eliott thought that would be weird, it wasn’t weird at all. 

“So, you into cars, huh?” Lucas finally asked and he turned into the next street which surprised Eliott because Lucas’s clearly had some purpose now and he forgot to inform Eliott about it. He also needed a moment to connect the dots that Lucas was talking about. 

“Oh, nooo, I’m definitely not into cars cars, I was talking about that Pixar animation. I’m a pretty huge fan so don’t even dare to make fun of me that I’m old and still watching movies for kids.” 

“No judgment!” The blue-eyed boy answered right away, putting his hands up and smiling so brightly that finally Eliott was a witness of the widest smile that Lucas had shown in front of him till this moment. It was nice to see him in a different state than just an angry asshole mode. 

“No judgment if you also won’t judge me.” He added next second, stopping his walk. Eliott looked at the boy with confusion because of what the heck he was talking about. 

“That’s my work. And hobby. And life basically.” Eliott still had no idea what was going on, not until he looked behind Lucas and he saw the comic book store. 

“You work here?” He asked, not even hiding his excitement. The store looked awesome even from outside so Eliott only could imagine how great it was behind doors. 

“Yup.” He answered, swaying himself on the heels. “No judgment for sure.” Eliott said, still full of amazement. He stepped closer to see what exactly was inside the shop. He heard some key clicking right beside him and when he glanced at Lucas it was him that caused such noise with the lock, Eliott saw he was opening the entrance to the store. 

“You can just open it whenever you want? Your boss won’t be mad at you?” Eliott was really worried about Lucas’s job, he didn’t want to cause any troubles. 

“Well, I am gonna ask him. Hey boss, are you okay to open the shop to show it to a new friend? Oh yes Lucas, of course. Maybe your new friend would buy something so it’s not a problem.”

Lucas ended his little show and Eliott could only shake his head and laugh.

“So you the owner.” He stated after entering inside. And as Eliott assumed, it was even better from this side of the doors. Everywhere were shelves with movies, various categories. Many wall cupboards had boxes with pop figures and others were full of other weird stuff that Eliott had no idea what they were exactly but for sure from some movie or comic books. They also had a human size figure of Spider-man and Iron man, standing near to each other, or rather Iron man was making his famous pose and Spider-man was sticking to the wall just above the floor. 

“Wow.” The taller boy commented, wandering around the shop. Lucas hopped onto the front desk and was looking at the other boy, seeing all the amazement on his face. “You know, I’m not even a fan of those hero movies and stuff but I’m impressed. All the comics, and movies, just wow.” 

“You’re not a fan?” From all Eliott’s talk, Lucas caught only this and immediately Eliott felt a bit bad for revealing it, as if that meant he didn’t like Lucas’s shop but he liked it, very very much.

“Yeah, I mean, I know some things about them because my mum if she could, she would watch only marvel productions but I just don’t get all the, you know, fun from it. But it doesn’t mean that I don’t enjoy being in your store. It’s really awesome.” 

Eliott was talking but he felt that Lucas’s mind was wandering somewhere else. He only hoped that he wasn’t the reason that Lucas’s expression changed so fast. 

“Why such an idea?” The boy asked, pointing his hands somewhere in the air, to indicate what he was talking about. He was also trying to be not bothered by Lucas’s temporary mind absence. 

Lucas hawked and jumped off from the counter. 

“Well, after my university turned out to be the worst idea of my life ever, or maybe one the worst I couldn’t think about anything else what I could do in my life and then, one day when I was driving for almost two hours just to buy a copy of my favorite comic book I realized that it was something that I couldn't find around the place of my living, so after Arthur said that he would help me, we started this business.”

“Arthur? The cute glasses boy Arthur?” Eliott inquired, and just after saying those words he realized what he said. “Yes, that cute boy.” The other answered without even paying attention to Eliott’s reaction. But he could see that little smile on Lucas’s face so he knew that his word didn’t remain unnoticed. 

“We were at the college together, finance wasn’t my thing after all but Arthur is pretty good with it. I bet he would be awesome with all the numbers without any paper but he said that maybe our shop would need some backup in the future. So yeah, this is the place that I’m spending most of my days and I regret nothing.” 

Even though Eliott had no idea what or who made Lucas apologize properly this morning but at that moment he was so grateful for whatever happened or whoever had such an impact on the other boy. It was amazing to see Lucas in such a new light. He was a completely new person to Eliott and he couldn’t believe that he was the same jerk with that pitty behavior and annoying voice. 

This new Lucas was the one that Eliott wanted to keep in his life. 

And he became aware that he was scared of that thought and how fast it appeared in his head. It took Lucas about an hour to win Eliott over. That was impressive and very scary in the boy opinion but for some time he prefered to not focusing on it. 

“So, what I should buy for my mum if all she talks about is Iron Man and the greatness of Robert Downey Jr.?” Eliott asked, grinning towards Lucas and he saw something was different on the other boy’s face. Something had changed and probably the first time in Eliott’s life, he was completely clueless about what was happening around him. 

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is half-way done and I'll try to post each chapter every Sunday. (I promised that to myself so it's gonna be okay, or at least I hope so, ha)  
> Special thanks to my lovely smile-mf /tumblr/ for the amazing fic-pic!  
> 


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